It was almost midnight on a Friday night several years ago, and I was returning home from a church social with a friend. We were stopped at a stoplight just a block away from home and didn’t even notice the black BMW in front of us. That is, we didn’t notice it until the trunk slowly opened and a boy, clad only in duct tape and blue boxer shorts, climbed out of it.

His hands were bound, his mouth was taped shut, and his eyes were wide with fear. He took a split second to survey his surroundings and then dashed across oncoming traffic racing towards a nearby neighborhood. Seconds later, two boys from inside the BMW flung open their doors and chased after him, one waving a baseball bat high over his head as he ran.

My heart started pounding, and I double-checked my doors to make sure they were locked. On impulse I grabbed my cell phone and dialed 9-1-1. Since the trunk on the BMW was still open, I couldn’t see the license plate number I wanted to report, so when the BMW sped through the light, I was hot on its tail, waiting for the trunk to shut with the acceleration. I yelled at the 9-1-1 operator the minute I could see the plate, “Take down this license plate! Take down this number!” Then, figuring it unwise to continue following the car full of angry teenagers, I let them get away and parked on a side street to finish reporting the crime.

“Let’s see if we can find the boy!” I said as I hung up the phone, and we drove around the neighborhood looking for any sign of the boy or the BMW. Finally, when we were stopped at the same stoplight as before, we saw the car again. Across the street in a restaurant parking lot, five police cars appeared as if from nowhere and surrounded the black BMW. The policemen got out, guns drawn, and slowly approached the car.

My friend and I watched from a distance as the scene unfolded. The cops lined the boys along the side of the BMW and slammed their hands on the hood. Then they opened the trunk of the car revealing the same half-naked, scared little boy inside. They helped him out of the trunk as my friend and I bounced up and down in victory celebrating that the boy was finally safe, and that we had been instrumental in his release.

When Christians are in sin, we should be like that boy locked in the trunk. That boy had to be forced into the trunk. He had to be bound, gagged, and dragged into captivity before the hood of the trunk slammed down on top of him. And once inside, he didn’t give up and accept defeat. Instead, as soon as the first opportunity to escape presented itself, he took off running as far and as fast as he could away from his captors.

The Bible says that “each one is tempted when, by his own evil desire, he is dragged away and enticed” (James 1:14 NIV). James thought highly of us when he said that we had to be “dragged away and enticed” into sin. Many times that’s not the case at all. All too often, all Satan has to do is suggest we get in the trunk and we hop in voluntarily and close the hood for him.

We should approach the possibility of falling into temptation with the same drive and determination we would use if someone was trying to lock us into the trunk of a car. We should fight it! We should run from it! And at the very first chance, we should escape it!

  Let’s Talk! How do you avoid hopping in to the trunk of sin?