DETECTING A SCAM

  

  One morning, sitting at the dining room table, I answered the phone after one ring — should have let the answering machine get it. 

“Hello, Grandpa,” a male voice said. 

“Hello,” I said, knowing I don’t have grandchildren.

“This is Kyle,” he said. “I’ve had an accident in Georgia, and they’ve brought me to the police department because my car’s messed up and there are some minor charges. I hope you can help me by calling my lawyer.” 

I thought it might be Kyle, Barbara’s grandson who is his thirties. Once, while he was over at our house and helping his father, Jack, Barbara’s son, work in the garage out back, he called me “grandpa.” 

“The officer has given me only a few minutes to call,” he said. My case number is _______ (he gave me a long list of numbers). Please call my lawyer.” 

I asked, “What is your mother’s name?”

“Officer, I’m getting off now, … .” he said.

The phone went dead. 

Barbara wondered what I was doing.

“He says he’s Kyle and has been in a wreck and is Georgia,” I said. “I’m pretty sure it’s a scam.” 

I called the number for his “lawyer.” 

“Hello,” a nice lady’s voice said. I think she gave me a name. I told her the case number. 

“Yes, we have that here,” she said. I think she gave me Kyle’s name. “What is your name?”

“My name is Steve,” I said.

“What is your last name?” she asked. 

“I’d rather not say,” I said..

“We can’t give out details of the case unless you give us your last name,” she said.

I hung up the phone.

Barbara called Jack. He said his son Kyle was not in Georgia.

DECEPTION

Craig Brian Larson tells this story: 

The Portia spider is a predator whose chief weapon is deception. To begin with, says Robert R. Jackson in National Geographic, the spider looks like a piece of dried leaf or foliage blown into the web. When it attacks other species of spiders, it uses a variety of methods to lure the host spider into striking range. 

Sometimes it crawls onto the web and taps the silken threads in a manner that mimics the vibrations of a mosquito caught in the web. The host spider comes out for dinner and instead becomes a meal itself. 

The Portia spider can tailor its deception for its prey. With a type of spider that maintains its home inside a rolled-up leaf, the Portia dances on the outside of the leaf, imitating a mating ritual. 

Jackson writes, “Portia can find a signal for just about any spider by trial and error. It makes different signals until the victim spider finally responds — then keeps making the signal that works.” 

Like the Portia spider, Satan’s weapon of choice is deception.   

THE BIBLE on DECEIT

“Lying lips are an abomination to the Lord” (Proverbs 12:22a ESV).

“Deliver my soul, O Lord, from lying lips, and from a deceitful tongue” (Psalm 120:2). 

“And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die” (Genesis 3:4).

“Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it” (Jesus words in John 8:44).  

“See to it that no one takes you captive by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the world, and not according to Christ” (Colossians 2:8 ESV).  

“But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves” (James 1:22).