The Good, The Bad, and The Unexpected

Being a small businessman, I know there’s only two kinds of customer service:

1) Good

2) Bad

The so-called  ‘great’ customer service experience is a myth. For there is no quality or measure of pleasurable experiences which will not be immediately offset by a single ‘bad’ one.

Whether it’s a big a boo-boo such as losing your customer’s personal info or just simply putting someone on hold for 25 minutes without resolving their problem, it won’t matter how many extra miles you’ve gone leading up to that one unfortunate detour. In the customer’s mind, you now have ‘bad’ customer service.

So with that in mind, I sent up a quick prayer this morning for the Lord’s Spirit to guide my actions just before going out to greet the delivery drivers whose truck had just pulled into my driveway.

You see, a couple of weeks ago, I had refused delivery of this same package because it was so unacceptable, I could actually see the damaged product inside the box without even opening it.

Add to that the somewhat-less-than-servile attitude of the company’s Customer Service Department during the interim two weeks, and I was definitely expecting a ‘bad’ experience. Like root-canal bad.

(Cue theme from “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly” as we rack focus from behind me in my doorway out to the truck in the driveway.)

But wait! Not only were all the boxes in perfect order, the men loading them were as well, being humbly in His service first.

I actually ended up not only tipping them generously (which gives me much more joy than being put on hold for 25 minutes), but I gave them my card with a promise to do more business with them in the future.

For you see, it turns out the driver is just about ready to launch his own delivery service in my area. He only needs a few more dollars towards his first truck and he will be ready to offer a Grace-based alternative to his less- than-optimum current employer.

So not only did I get my stuff in good condition this time, I now have a new Personal Team Member for all my large-box deliveries and a brother of high integrity to call friend as well.

With customer service, there’s only: The Good and The Bad.

With God, you can always add: The Unexpected.

You just have to make sure you ask for it.

James 4:2

All (Green) Thumbs

I always thought squirrels were the biggest pests in my yard. Next to mosquitoes, that is.

But don’t get me started on mosquitoes. The creation of those airborne annoyances is one of my top three ‘why’ questions for God when I meet Him face to face. Right after brussel sprouts and voting on weekdays.

Rather, there is one more dreaded than Jumpy Squirrel in my yard.

I speak now of the slug. You know, those pre-pubescent snails that eat all your sunflower seedlings before they even reach 2 inches tall?

They have single-handedly (or single-antennaely) eaten no less than 3 different crops of young “sonny-flowers” planted by my kids and me over the last month.

Yes, you may speak of learning the value of perseverance in the face of disappointment. Of patience and hard work. Of diligence and humility. Why I might even allow you a few seconds of waxing poetic on the beauty of co-existing with the ecosystem.

But really, all I wanted is to be able to grow one silly little sunflower and save the perseverance lessons for the baseball field and the ballet studio. Is that so wrong?

And then I remembered…my son doesn’t play baseball yet and my daughter wouldn’t know a plie from a pie. They’re 4 and 2. They plant sunflowers. That’s what they do.

So maybe God wanted to conduct a little “early childhood education” of his own with this one? And not only that, maybe I needed a little “remedial education” myself?

Submitting to God’s will doesn’t always make sense at the time.

It’s OK to be ‘all thumbs’, even when you don’t have a green one.

Jonah 4

Sam Cooke Had It Right

Don’t know much about talk radio.

But I do know that if you want ‘the whole truth and nothing but the truth’ you’d be better off  watching a Perry Mason rerun.

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Don’t know much about cable news.

But I do know that they put a lot more energy into creating truth than uncovering it.

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Don’t know much about Washington DC.

See previous, but substitute ‘corruption’ for ‘truth’.

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Don’t know much about “The Left” or “The Right”.

But I do know they both trust talk radio, cable news and Washington DC way too much.

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Oh yeah, and one other thing I do know…

Sam Cooke knew a whole lot more than he let on.

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“But I do know that I love you.

And I know that if you loved me too,

What a wonderful world this would be.”

1Corinthians 16:14

When’s Your Joy?

This morning when I walked into my 4-year-old son’s room to make that final nudge toward the breakfast table, I interrupted his final chorus of  “Joy, Joy, Joy, Joy, Down In My Heart” as he was pulling up his socks.

Have to admit. Never taught him that one. Never sang it with him.

It got me to thinking. When was the last time that I sang a worship song on my own, when I was the only one in the room, just because …well, because I was joyous!?!

My son didn’t stop the song when I came in. He finished. Loudly. And then he smiled and asked, “Dada, why do they only talk about Tuesday in that song?”

“Tuesday? What do you mean, son?”

“Y’know, at the end, when it says ‘…down in my heart TUES-DAY!’”

He may have the words slightly off, but trust me, he knows all about joy.

And his definitely ain’t just on Tuesdays.

Isaiah 11:6

The “14′s”

I’ve lived almost 46 years now.

In that time I’ve gone through a lot of changes:

My politics (voted for Reagan in ’84, Clinton both times, and ‘W’ both times)

My personal habits (haven’t had a drink, a dip, or a smoke in just over 14 years)

My health (cancer-free since 1992).

And as I ‘make the turn’ on my life’s 18 holes,  I’ve finally settled upon a ‘life verse’…actually two.

I call them the “14′s”.

2Chronicles 7:14 and 1Corinthians 16:14

And while I highly recommend to the gentle reader that he or she go through a detailed process of discovering their own life verse(s), I humbly suggest these two as a good starting point.

You might ask, ‘Why do I even need a life verse?”

Well, maybe you don’t.

But then again, what do you have to lose?

Just remember, the next time you come up against something that angers, confuses or frustrates you to the point of violence (be it verbal or physical), a good life verse can bring you right back to the foot of the Cross.

And that is where peace resides.

My peace lives at the “14′s”.

Google them some time.

Can You Disappear?

What made Moses great?

His courage?

His faith?

His patience?

Or was it something more subtle?

One of my favorite verses in the Bible is 2Chronicles 7:14

“If my people, among whom my Name is called upon, do humble themselves, and pray and seek my presence, and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear in heaven and be merciful to their sin, and will heal their land.”

That verse states what I believe to be God’s basis for all right relationship with Him and with each other – humility. It is the “starting point” from which all personal interaction must flow if we are to be true servant-leaders for Christ.

Moses’ greatness was in his humility. His ability and willingness to “disappear” in service to God and to His people. To make himself nothing, even though he would seem to be most deserving of God’s richest rewards here on earth.

After more than 40 years of faithful and expectant service to God in the desert, he was denied entry into the Promised Land on what some would call a “technicality”. Yet just before his death, he pronounced this prayer over the people of Israel:

“Though He love the people, yet all Thy Saints are in Thine hands: and they are humbled at Thy feet, to receive Thy words.” (Deut. 33:3 )

When the time of testing came, Moses placed God’s Glory over his own.

He disappeared.

Can you?

No Food For Thought: The Prayer Diet

I’ve been trying to lose about 10 pounds since some time between the days of Malachi and Matthew.

When I was 21, I could basically go on a Cheerios diet, run a round the track a few times a week, and drop 15 pounds in a month. Now, unless I go hungry most of the day and maintain a rigid daily exercise program, I have no shot.

In fact, I probably shouldn’t even assume success then because I have yet to accomplish both of those things at the same time.

So what’s a person who would like not to be miserable most of the day and also be in good enough shape to play with his two kids more than five minutes at a time…to do?

The answer: A Prayer Diet.

It’s basically a practical response to Romans 7:15.

“For what I would, that do I not: but what I hate, that do I.”

Whenever I’m tempted to indulge my flesh in whatever I shouldn’t (most times, for me it’s eating a brownie at 10:00pm right before beddy-bye), I pray for someone on my prayer list instead.

I’ve found that it is really hard to have the same enjoyment whilst indulging myself when I am praying for someone else. As Paul points out in Galatians 5:17, the two are mutually exclusive.

“For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh: and these are contrary one to another, so that ye cannot do the same things that ye would.” (1599 Geneva translation)

Plus, I pray a lot more for others than I ordinarily would on this “diet”. I think most of us would like to do that more regularly anyway, right?

So give the Prayer Diet a try! It just may work for you, too. Or at the very least, it’ll get you thinking of others a lot more than you were before…which ain’t such a bad thing either.”)