Confronting evil at the Dollar Tree

I suppose it wasn't the fact that the little kid approached me, a complete stranger, that caught me off guard.  It was his response to my off-handed question.  My mind was lost in the swirling plastic junk imported from China also called the Dollar Tree.  We were wasting away a rainy, cold afternoon by letting the boys spend a dollar and find a treasure.  In order to pass the time, I play little games with myself.  One of my favorites is "Find something not made in China."  After mastering this game (hint: food products are an easy winner), I play "What is the weirdest thing I could spend a dollar on?"  Today's winner was a little knife-type product for opening plastic packaging.  The picture on the front was a man's face evidently embroiled in a mental meltdown from attempting to open plastic packaging.  The slogan on the back "This will be the last plastic packaging you ever fight with."  Not bad. 

But my game was interrupted by the bold kid, "My mom told me I could get this."  Holding out his little plastic bow and arrow set he looked at me, a total stranger for approval.  Jolted back into reality and a little surprised by his statement, I asked the boy, "Oh, are you going to fight evil with that?"
"No, I don't really have any evil at home."  And then in the same breath he added, "But I do have a step-dad.  I will fight him."

I smirked and nodded in approval as my mind jumped into his living room where the hunt for the "evil" step-dad was in full swing.  The Chinese-made plastic bow was stressed to the max with the suction cup arrow trained right on his step-dad's unknowing forehead.  Yes, fighting evil indeed.

I suppose we are all looking for a little evil to fight.  Somehow I am of more value if I can overcome some evil, cartoon-like force.  Yes, I wish I had some evil to confront.  Maybe a dragon.  Or maybe a slave-trader.  A drug lord.  Something like that.  But I am a church person.  The people I associate with are church people.  I have never met a slave-trader and seriously doubt the existence of dragons.  And so my quandary waits.  It waits until I am examining my newly shaved head in the mirror at home.  And suddenly I am faced with real evil.  It is me!  The guy that grew up at church camp, who has more pastors in his ancestry than he can count, who went to the Christian college, who married the Christian girl, who has the Christian sons, that works at Christian school and has a lizard named Tebow.  Pure, unadulterated evil.  My black heart is the dragon.  And I can do nothing about it.

"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is a gift of God - not by works so that no one can boast."  Ephesians 2:9-10 (NIV)

So my ability to slay the dragon has nothing to do with me.  In fact, the slaying was a gift that I received because I was God's workmanship.  Dang.  I wanted to do the slaying so that I could get the fame and then tell people about it.  Almost like boasting.  And so I am left staring at the balding 34-year-old dragon in the mirror that is totally dependant upon God to win. 

And I sit in church with all the other black-hearted-yet-redeemed souls and listen to the testimony of some of my close friends.  And now I remember why this inability to slay the dragon and confront evil is not such a problem.  It is in my reliance upon Christ that I truly begin to see what I was made for.  Take a few minutes and watch this testimony.  It is powerful. 

And so with my sin nailing Christ to the shameful cross and Him in turn becoming my joy, I now see that the evil that I felt so compelled to fight has already been destroyed.  There is nothing left for me to do, but to step out and see the good works that God prepared in advance for me to do.  And do them.