So, should I have responded regarding the first three, or the last person who actually answered my question, informing me that AT&T does not actually give any real customer service? Those were not his actual words, but that is an accurate summary or the reality.
This by the way, was after being on hold for over an hour! First is the set of unrelated automated questions that must be answered in order to be placed on hold for 50 minutes only to be connected to the wrong department in a foreign country.
Of course, AT&T compensates for this by sporadic reminders at about 15 second intervals telling the customer how much they value the person's phone call. But I was on hold for 50 minutes. Then I was passed on to two more reps. The third rep sent me to the Repair and Features Dept. This rep finally told me that the company did not keep a record of the information that I desired. I was told that it is only available when subpoenaed. I replied that the company obviously does keep the records, then, because something that does not exist cannot be produced for a subpoena.
Sometimes, a company like Bank of America will wait for a week or two before contacting by phone or e-mail regarding their lack of customer service. What is the point? By that time a person would have made several additional calls with the same result.
Someone recently asked me why companies are doing this.
The answer is that they are training us to accept the fact that we no longer have any say in anything. They are preparing us for what is coming very soon.
So, do we really have to accept this?
It would seem to be so, since seemingly everyone does. The tiny few who attempt to take action are easily ignored when the vast majority act like a group of lemmings, moving in mass without clear understanding of where they are going or why. But the group is moving and so do they. Off they go, chasing after the latest technological "improvement" or believing what their leaders and media tell them.
This post really has no good purpose except to complain about the fact that complaining does absolutely no good. It no longer even serves as a release of stress since we all seem to have the same response of: "Well, what can we do?"
The really sad thing is the awareness of the fact that people are not lemmings, but have great capacity for reactionary responses, often violent. The perpetrators are usually safely tucked away when the mobs finally rise up. The innocent are the ones who are hurt. This always seems to be the way. The population follows until they are stripped of everything, and then they rise up and hurt one another, acting even more mindlessly than when they threw their hands in the air doing nothing.
Even more saddening is the awareness that the Lord has provided the way in which these things do not occur. If only people would hear and heed His Word. If only people would believe His grace and mercy. How differently people would act if they believed what the Lord has declared.
For the tiny few, His Word does rule and they do live accordingly. They have little influence in the world, because they merely live in the world while not being of the world. Their ways seem odd, even irrational. Yet these few do have peace in their hearts and lives, true peace, peace that surpasses all understanding. This peace is even greater than the many frustrations that they encounter. This peace is greater than the sense of helplessness that they feel when ignored by leaders in governments and churches and corporations and communities and families.
So to this peace flee those who know it. Those who have heard and believed and have received this peace realize that all else is of no real consequence. And so, a man like myself will whine and complain, but in the end will be turned aside again by that which has been poured out from above in the body of Christ. In Him telephones and computers and finances are shown to be the needless things that they really are. Customer service is truly non-existent in the body of Christ for there are no customers, only members of the same body. All together are servants of one another, bound together with the same will, the same concerns, the same joys, the same cause for thanksgiving.
It truly is miraculous what the Lord works in and for those who love Him, the called according to His purpose. The whining becomes thanksgiving. The envy and disillusionment are converted to contentment. The unrest of heart, mind, and spirit are transformed to peace and unity.
Truly the saints find that they naturally respond with the Psalms in saying:
O give thanks unto the Lord; for he is good: because his mercy endureth for ever. (Psalm 118:1)
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5 comments:
Pastor Siems,
Your posting calls to mind the devotional writings of Pastor John Parcher. We note this in the succinct contrast made between the frustrations worked in us by customer service failures, and the contentment worked by the Spirit with His Means of Grace which is grasped by the saints through faith. "In this world you all will have trouble; but take heart, I have overcome the world."
Gary Cepek
Something that I continue to notice is that because of the continual contact with the Pure Gospel though the Lord's unadulterated Communion, the Scriptures are never far away so that the Holy Spirit's work is very quick and effectual. Since the Scriptures are always "not far" but "in your mouth & heart" they are able to do what is promised.
But what saith it? The word is nigh thee, even in thy mouth, and in thy heart: that is, the word of faith, which we preach; That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
(Romans 10:8-10)
Meaning:
When one continues in the gathering of the true Church, gathered to the pure and unadulterated means of grace, the confession that is in one's mouth and the faith that is in one's heart is the work of the Holy Spirit and saves the person from whatever other thoughts and ways that one might encounter in daily living.
Thus, complaining is quickly turned to thanksgiving and contentment in the Lord.
However, when one subjects oneself to the ways of a false gathering, in a congregation where the means of grace are compromised and adulterated in various ways, when the ways of men and of the world are mingled with the activities of the congregation, what does one have in one's mouth and heart as one goes about the day's activities?
If the pure doctrine of the unadulterated Word is not what is continually confessed then the pure doctrine is not what is embraced in the heart. How then can the Holy Spirit use the pure doctrine of the Word to help the person when the trials of life rise up? If those with whom a person congregates and worships are those who embrace compromise, what will the person embrace in one's own heart and mind and turn to in one's daily walk?
A very fine article and exceptional blog. Is there any way I can subscribe to new articles, you know like acquiring them on email or something like that.
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