The View from a New Pair of Specs

Nothing messes with the mind and emotions of a shopper more than rearranging the items for sale in a grocery store. No matter what the reasoning behind the reorganization, customers are convinced that the ultimate plan is to pull more money out of their pockets by making them hunt and search for the items they need, perhaps discovering new items to buy in the process. They resent the extra time and effort they have to put into filling their carts, and by the time they reach the checkout lane their rage has reached the boiling point and is ready to spill over onto the first store employee they see, usually the hapless cashier standing behind the register.

I listened to my share of customer complaints yesterday after clocking in for my shift. At first I was sympathetic to the customers' frustration, understanding that their time is valuable and they don't appreciate it being wasted for a purpose that doesn't seem to benefit them in any way. But as the day wore on and customer after customer spilled their vitriol over me, I went from sympathetic to apathetic to wishing I'd doubled up on my blood pressure medicine before coming in that day. I simply pasted a smile on my face, bit my tongue and reminded myself that as paying customers they had a right to voice their opinions and I was being paid to patiently stand there and listen.

One customer talked himself into a better frame of mind all by himself! At first he was angry, and I listened to his criticism in silence, nodding occasionally, so he couldn't accuse me of completely ignoring him. Once he had spilled his guts, he said, “But I know you had nothing to do with the decision to move things around.”

I nodded in agreement.

“And you probably have to shop here and be frustrated like the rest of us.”

“Very true,” I answered.

“And eventually we'll all learn where things are again.”

“Now you're talking...,” I said in agreement.

“And in the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter very much, does it?”

“Buddy, now you're singing my song!” I told him.

That was the point in a nutshell, as another customer told a fellow shopper he met in the aisle. He listened to her voice her complaints to anyone who was near as long as he could take it. Then he turned to her, a complete stranger, and said, “Listen, I was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease yesterday, and today you're upset because you can't find where they put the spaghetti? I don't even want to hear it.” He noted her subdued silence as he turned and went on his way.

It's a matter of perspective, for sure. And sometimes we simply need to similarly confront our pessimism head on and remind ourselves of what is truly important in life. While an extended shopping venture is a frustrating inconvenience, it is not the end of the world. We would realize that if we for a moment we shelved our complaints and focused our eyes on all that we have to be thankful for. For starters we could be grateful that we have the ability to come to the store and shop, money in our pockets with which to buy food, and such an abundance of goods that finding one particular item in their midst becomes a game instead of a chore. When we change the way we look at things, suddenly the overstocked shelves that seemed to be a curse we now view as overflowing with blessings from which we get to choose.

Usually the things we complain about aren't the real issue; rather they reveal the existence of a deeper problem on the inside. We're not really looking for items on grocery shelves per se. Instead, we're searching for the joy in our hearts that we lost somewhere along life's way. Everything that comes out of our mouths, regardless of where we are, just indicates its absence.

Each day following the recent remodel, the manager at our store assigned one of the cashiers to roam the aisles with no other job than to help the customers find the items they needed. Several times that was my assignment, and I walked the aisles sporting a black sash with the word “INFORMATION” in bold white letters across the front and a map of the store in my hand. My task was to find shoppers who looked lost, and together we would locate what they were looking for.

If you're searching for joy, I can help you with that, as well. The trick to finding it lies in wearing a special pair of spectacles. Put on your gratitude glasses and see not just your shopping trip but your life in a whole new light.

“So here's what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life – your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life – and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him. Don't become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You'll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you, and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you, develops well-formed maturity in you.”

(Romans 12:1-2 MSG)

Rib Tickler

“You're doing a demo in deli today,” I was told after I'd clocked in to work. “Giving out samples of ribs.”

Thinking it a pleasant change of pace from my regular cashier duties, quickly I headed to the back of the store where I found a table set up with all the necessary supplies and a deli cook already cutting up the racks of ribs she had just pulled out of the oven. It was the start of Labor Day weekend, and many people would be gathering with family and friends to bid farewell to summer. Offering the shoppers a taste of the store's pre-cooked baby back ribs alerted them to the possibility of eating such great summertime fare without the work of cooking them up themselves. Many tossed a half-rack or two into their carts before continuing on.

It wasn't your usual shopping sample, to be sure. A hot piece of meat covered with barbeque sauce, it took the sight of the nearby napkins to convince many to accept the treat and give it a try despite the accompanying mess. But one by one, as they returned to discard the bones and waste in my trash basket, they uniformly declared them to be delicious.

Soon the deli cooks had trouble keeping pace with the rate at which the shoppers were gobbling up what was offered to them, and I was told to be a little less aggressive in getting the customers to sample our wares. Thus “repeat samplers” began to be a problem. Most people were reticent to ask for another sample; others not so much. One little boy in particular stole my heart. After tugging on his dad's shirttails repeatedly to get his attention and let him try one of the ribs in the first place, he was soon standing before me again, a happy smile splitting a round little face that was covered in barbecue sauce from ear to ear.

“Can I have another?” he asked. Totally unable to resist him, I handed him what he wanted and he ran off to rejoin his dad.

Some of the adult customers were less appealing, and I had to remind myself repeatedly that I was just there to hand out the samples, not judge people on their manners. And I certainly couldn't vocalize my disdain. So I kept my mouth tightly closed when one particularly annoying man came by for a third time with his hand extended for more...until he complained that the shopper before him had received a bigger piece!

“Isn't this number three for you today?” I asked in reply. Embarrassed, he laughed guiltily and walked away, rib in hand, and I knew I had broken the cardinal rule of not alienating a customer in any way, shape or form. It was one I had struggled with repeatedly with this particular man, an aggressively social shopper who regularly halts the checkout process completely while he tells jokes and strikes up conversations with total strangers. I groan inwardly whenever I see him headed my way. 

God doesn't, however. As if to prove the point, He immediately sent the little round-faced boy back to likewise ask for a third sample, his bright smile and sparkling eyes his bargaining chips. I folded completely, handing him a juicy hunk of meat with a smile to match his own and not a word of condemnation. Noting my response to the little boy, God nudged me and said, “That's how I feel when I see the other guy you so dislike.”

In that moment I was forced to admit that my response to people is based at least somewhat on their behavior, their looks, their personality and my personal preferences in those areas. God simply sees everybody as His precious child. It's not that He is blind to our imperfections; they are simply covered up in the blood of His Son. Thus He responds to us based on that relationship, rather than the right or wrong in our actions. And it is the overwhelming love He has for each us that works in us to bring those actions in line with the “good” that He proclaimed over us at creation.

And so I smile now when I see that particularly annoying shopper coming towards me, because I know God is doing the same. Funny, it is me who was changed as a result of our last encounter, while I thought it was he who needed the work! God reminded me with a chuckle of His own that He can still do a lot with a piece of rib...

“Then the rib which the Lord God had taken from man He made into a woman...”

(Genesis 2:22 NKJV)

Surprise in the Skies

Photo courtesy of Kevin Bridge

“I told you I'd be back,” the customer said to me, now ready to come through my line at the grocery store.

With business a little slow at that hour on a Sunday morning I'd been standing at the end of my lane, looking for people who might be ready to check out. I had spotted the man earlier, and had tried to wave him in as he passed by, but apparently he wasn't finished shopping yet. With one more item yet to pick up in the far end of the store, he pointed in that direction as he pushed on, saying, “I'll be back!”

True to his word, there he was. His order was quickly processed and he went on his way, but the words he said echoed loudly in my mind, to the point that I grabbed a scrap of paper and wrote them down.

“I told you I'd be back.”

Maybe because it was a Sunday morning and I was sensitive to missing church, his words to me were more than just a casual comment after crossing the last item off his shopping list. They were a reminder of a spiritual scenario in which we are all participants, whether we're aware of it or not.

When Jesus was gathered with His disciples the last time before His crucifixion, He tried to explain to them that He was leaving for a time, but would return. They didn't understand. He said that He was going away to prepare a place for them, and that He would come back for them, so that they would be together once more.

Since that day, Christians everywhere have been awaiting the fulfillment of that promise. I've noticed, however, that we wait in different ways. Truly, some of us have quit looking for His return altogether, much as I did the customer who walked away from me to get the last item on his list. Out of sight, out of mind, and I quickly forgot about him, until there he stood some time later at the end of my lane once more. And so do we simply carry on with the duties of our days, loving God and living out our days to the best of our abilities, but no longer really expecting Him to return to our world before we leave it and join Him in His.

Others of us, however, are in a hurry to get out of here, to leave the trials and troubles of our earthly existence behind, to check out of this life and get on with the better life promised in the next one – no sorrow, no pain...just joy unspeakable and full of glory. We look for God to come back as impatiently as do the customers in line behind someone who forgot that one item he absolutely has to have! Off he dashes to get it while everybody behind him groans in unison at the delay. They busy themselves for a minute or two looking about them and checking their phones, but after a while every head is turned in the direction the errant customer went, muttering, “Where is he?”, their eyes searching the aisle for the first sight of his bobbing head, hurrying in return.

The truth is that God is busy crossing items off a list, as well...not food items, but the names of our friends and neighbors. He is busy looking for the last of the lost souls that were invited to the Marriage Supper of the Lamb but have yet to make their commitment to attend. If your loved one's name is on that list, then you are grateful for the patience of the Father Who longs with all His heart for every one of His children to make it Home for the feast.

That doesn't mean we just stand idly by in the meantime. Unlike the other customers in my line, we, too, have work to do to hasten the process along. We should be about the Father's business, but with an open eye and an ear cocked to hear the trumpet's call when the guest list is complete and the Hall is filled. He expects us to be watchfully waiting, as He told His disciples when they pressed Him for details about the timing of His return. He told them to look for the signs of His coming in the world around them.

There are a multitude of strange and unusual phenomena happening around us these days. Arctic snowy owls are spotted in Florida, of all places, while bears not yet in hibernation because of the warm weather wander on ski slopes empty of people because there has been no snow. Devastating extremes in weather conditions bake our hometowns in heat and drought, wash them away in record-breaking floods or bury them in overwhelming snow. Are these simply the result of cyclic changes in weather and animal population patterns, or are they something more? At the very least they should remind us to be looking for the signs of the end of the age that Jesus said would signal His soon return, that we might not be caught unawares.

My Sunday morning customer's sudden reappearance startled me, I admit. He looked at me with a question in his eyes, a tilt to his head and a slight smile on his lips, as if perplexed at my reaction.

“I told you I'd be back.”

Jesus said “...raise your eyes and observe the fields and see how they are already white for harvesting” (John 4:35, emphasis mine)...words to live by, that His return doesn't likewise take me by surprise.

“Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come...So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.”

(Matthew 24:42,44 NIV)

Busted on the Bottom

I failed a “mystery shop” on the job last week.

The company routinely sends “secret shoppers” throughout the store to ensure that all employees are doing their jobs in the prescribed manner, and as part of that procedure a shopper came through my checkout lane to have her order processed. Apparently I failed to ask a required question, offering my assistance with any items on the bottom of the bascart.

It wasn’t just a personal failure; it affected the score for the entire store. Although they were all very nice about it, several superiors, including the store manager herself, mentioned it to me. Conscientious though I am about asking the question, I clearly didn’t do so this one time that counted, and so had to sign a write up for the incident, indicating that I understood the requirement was that I ask the BOB question every time a shopper comes through my line. Simple though my job is, I enjoy it tremendously and it’s important to me that I do it well. I was crushed.

My boss had mentioned that I’d been working with a particular bagger at the time, one who is a special friend and with whom I’ve received great ratings in the past. When I told her later what had happened this time around, her eyes widened in surprise and she said, “I remember that order! Don’t you?! You said, ‘I forgot to ask that lady the bottom-of-the-bascart question. She’s probably the mystery shopper.’”!

Suddenly I did remember saying those very words, and could’ve kicked myself for speaking the situation out of my own mouth! Perhaps you’re thinking that the shopper in question would’ve been the examiner whether I’d verbally declared her to be so or not, and while that’s very likely the case, the irony of the situation made me laugh, which at least made me feel better about things as I went on with my day.

For some reason, failures are easier to bear when they have a lesson attached to them in some way, and I found that the value in this episode had nothing to do with the grocery store at all. It was the activity of my tongue which was in question. Words of wisdom found in Proverbs 18:21 came quickly to mind: “Death and life are in the power of the tongue…” Simply put, our words matter, and what we verbally declare over our loved ones, our lives, and ourselves affects our future more than we can possibly imagine.

Discouragement followed that thought, as I felt unable to watch every word that comes out of my mouth, so often do they come out almost without conscious thought. Clearly that is what God wants to change. Just as quickly did I realize that I am unable to right the situation on my own; He simply has to help me. I pray daily that God would place a guard over what comes out of my mouth; perhaps opening my eyes to the problem in such a creative way is the first step in that very process.

But it’s not always the words that come out of my mouth that are the problem; as in the shopping scenario described above, often it’s the words that don’t. There are many times apart from when I’m behind a cash register that I think of questions I should but don’t ask. For example, I sometimes avoid asking, “What’s going on?” to a person I’m afraid might just tell me when I’m short on time or interest. I might leave out the necessary, “Can I pray for you?” at the end of some such recitals, for fear of attracting too much attention or embarrassing the confidant. And my reluctance sometimes to ask, “Do you know Jesus?” makes me wonder at times if I really do, either. And yet I know that life is found in the power of the tongue that leads people into a relationship with God.

The paragraphs above were already typed into the computer when God penned a special postscript to them a few days later. Once again I was at work and had just thanked a family for shopping with us when I saw them head to the customer service desk instead of out the door. I hoped it was only my imagination when I heard my name mentioned, but my heart sank when I saw an assistant store manager approach my check lane a short time later to pull me aside and speak to me privately.

“A complaint has been filed against you,” he began, “but before we talk about it I just want to say thank you.” Thoroughly confused, I could only look at him for an explanation. Thankfully, this time I had remembered to ask the shoppers about the bottom of their cart (whew!), but the question had offended them. They thought I was insinuating that they were trying to steal something and wanted to assure the management that they’d never stolen anything before and didn’t plan to start now. Quickly it was explained to them that asking the question is company policy in an attempt to stem the flow of unpurchased stock left unnoticed on the bottom of the carts, a loss due more to simple employee inattention than suspected customer theft.

Similarly there are times when people will react negatively to questions God wants us to ask. Their response does not negate the need to ask the question; it only indicates a lack of understanding of God’s purposes and a misjudgment on the intent of His heart. He wants the door to communication with Him to be opened, whether the subjects choose to walk through it or slam it shut. My job is simply to open the conversation.

My bagger friend was bothered to find that the failure with the BOB question was still on my mind a few days after the fact. We both know that there will be many more mystery shops and ample opportunities to ask all the right questions. But that is not necessarily the case with people whom God brings across my path on a day-to-day basis. Only He knows what their future holds, what they might be contemplating or what might happen to them the minute they walk again out of my life. My silence in that scenario might have consequences far more serious than a simple write up in my file.

How like God that He got my attention on a matter He wanted to discuss by weaving it into something that is very important to me - the pride and joy I take in my job. He reminds me that He did so only because it concerns something that is very important to Him - the pride and joy He takes in me.

“ …‘My son, do not make light of the Lord’s discipline, and do not lose heart when he rebukes you, because the Lord disciplines those he loves, and he punishes everyone he accepts as a son.’”

(Hebrews 12: 5-6 NIV)

Glove Lost, Purpose Found

The automatic door opened and the wintry weather carried a host of shoppers into the store in its icy blast. Most hesitated a moment at the entrance, removing hats, stashing gloves in pockets, and unzipping coats before grabbing their shopping lists and heading down the aisles. The situation then reversed itself once their passage through the checkout lane was completed, as they donned their winter garb and prepared to head out into the cold once more.

The process seemed to take longer than usual for one elderly female shopper who came through my line on that recent winter's day. Her order processed without problem, I was surprised to see her lingering in my lane, fumbling in her pockets and looking about her with a worried look on her face. Eventually she asked if I'd seen her missing red glove. There was no sign of it at the register, so she reluctantly moved off in the direction of the exit door. People leave belongings behind on a regular basis, and I thought to myself that this missing item was likewise no big deal - she'd either find it somewhere or get herself another pair. But instead of leaving the building, the woman remained in sight, circling the checkout area, her face registering her concern. The next time I saw her she told me she had repeatedly walked the whole store, retracing her steps to see if she might have dropped it anywhere. Finally realizing that there was more to her troubled heart than just a lost item of clothing, I listened as she told me the gloves were a gift from her sister who had since passed on. In her view they were simply irreplaceable.

Suddenly there was a heart connection to her problem that got my attention, and I started looking for that glove almost as determinedly as she. I looked through her grocery bags in case she had accidentally dropped it in one, and gently urged her to check her coat pockets one more time. Then I circled my register a couple of times myself, my eyes scanning all the nooks and crannies on the floor where an item might have been dropped and inadvertently kicked out of sight. No luck. I urged her to leave her name and number at the front desk so the store could contact her if it was found and turned in. Despondent, she turned to go and I went back to work physically, although my mind stayed on that woman and her distress over the missing connection with her departed sis.

A short time later I found myself with a few minutes to spare while there was nobody in my line. And suddenly I realized that while I could do little else to help her, I could pray. In recent weeks God had been building my faith with many answered prayers, and I firmly believed He would show up in this situation, as well. So I lifted a simple request in faith, affirming my belief that He knew where the missing glove was and asking that He direct her to it. And then I smiled to myself as I realized it was just the sort of situation He specializes in, after all - finding that which is lost and healing broken hearts! I went looking for my next customer, thinking the case was closed.

Not so, for ten minutes or so later my white-haired friend was back, a huge grin splitting her face and her hand madly flapping a red glove in my direction!

"I found it! I found it!" she called. Apparently she'd decided to take one more tour around the store and found the glove at last, lying on the edge of the meat counter where someone must have put it after running across it. We rejoiced together and then I watched as she finally exited the store, her step lighter and her heart happy once more.

I expected God to find her lost glove, but as usual He did more than that. It turned out that more than just a glove was missing. I had clearly lost my focus on why I stand behind that register in the first place. Surely it isn't just to earn a paycheck, scan some groceries and pass the time of day with a host of friendly patrons. He reminded me that He places me in all the situations I find myself each day deliberately, simply to be a conduit through which His love flows to the people around me. But when I get my eyes too tied to the physical nature of my surroundings, I lose sight of the heart connection to people that God feels and my spiritual awareness vanishes completely. I was ready to hurry that woman out of the store, her problem less pressing than processing my next customer's order. Yet God stopped, His heart touched by the trouble in hers. Surely I'm not busier than He. I needed the reminder to be about my Father's business even in my place of business, as well as in my home, my car... and in all the hidden corners of my life where His desires might have been dropped and absently kicked out of sight by the seemingly more pressing problems of the day.

I worked the rest of that day with a totally different attitude after bumping into God's presence that morning. Who knows but that God sent that woman to the store not for groceries, but for me... to get my thought life back on track. I'm just sorry she had to circle the store as many times as she did before I got the message! She may have found her lost glove, but I found my missing purpose. It's hard to say which of us was happier with the end result.

"Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep."
(Romans 12:15 NKJV)