Those discouraging phone calls

One day last week, I decided to stay home and catch up on some reading. It’s not often that I take a day off and don’t go to the office and just wander around the house. Sometimes it’s necessary to do something like that, and I don’t do it often enough.

The Gracious Mistress of the Parochial House had a day of shopping planned as well as an appointment with her doctor. She would be gone all day, so she would have the whole day to myself. She was looking forward to it. Who does not?

I was really wrong about this idea. For me, having a day alone is a wonderful idea, but she’s still in Kansas.

The wife had just left the building, I had settled in with a stack of books I needed to check out and of course a hot cup of coffee to my left. I was looking forward to a wonderful day. I sighed deeply and opened the first book.

Then I got a phone call. I wasn’t prepared for the phone call, so I answered it, hoping to speak to someone.

It was a reminder that my car warranty had expired, and if I pressed number 1, it would be transferred to someone who could renew it. They also said that this is the last chance I have to renew my warranty.

I want to get the definition of the word “last”. If this is the last chance I get, why have I received hundreds of these phone calls?

A few moments later, another phone call came.

I struggle with the idea of, is it okay to lie to someone who is lying to you?

The lady on the phone congratulated me on winning two round trip tickets to anywhere I wanted to go. All she had to do was go to her headquarters and they would put us up for three days and two nights, and food was included.

I don’t know how ideas dance in my head, but this one does.

I replied to the lady, “I’m sorry, but my religion doesn’t allow me to fly on planes.”

The crickets on the other side did a little concert and then she wrote back and said that I could give those tickets to whoever I wanted. All she had to do was go to her headquarters and everything would be fine.

“My religion,” I explained, “not only doesn’t allow me to fly on airplanes, but it doesn’t allow me to give anyone plane tickets. I appreciate your offer, but I can’t.”

Sometimes religion can be helpful. I chuckled the rest of the day. When I’m done laughing, I’ll confess my sin.

There were a few other phone calls, and I responded pretty similarly to all of them. If anyone can harass a telemarketer, he’s my wife’s favorite husband.

Then I got a phone call that I wasn’t prepared for. This phone call was from Duke Energy.

According to the person on the phone, they sent me four notices that my account was past due and my power was going to be cut off today.

This kind of rocked my afternoon. If I lose electricity, what do I do? And you know what it’s like to have your electricity restored with all the rates.

According to the person on the other end of the phone, I owed Duke Energy $998.59 over the last eight months that I have not paid.

If you want to get my attention just tell me you want my money.

“What can I do,” I asked desperately, “so they don’t cut off my electricity?”

So I told him I didn’t have that much money to pay. He was asking me for a credit card number so he could bring me up to date on my account.

“I can help you here,” he said, “by reducing your payment to $698.59.”

He realized that he was hesitating here, so he responded by saying, “If there is any problem, we will be able to refund your payment, so there is no risk.”

So, I heard in my head, “ding dong, the witch is dead.”

I began to realize that I was in the middle of a scam and I didn’t know it. As soon as I thought that, I knew he was in trouble, but not in the kind of trouble he was telling me about.

He gave me a number I could call and I knew it was the wrong number. After hanging up, I looked up my Duke Energy account and called them, and to my relief they told me it was a scam and my account was up to date.

I thought about this, and maybe this scam was payment for lying about plane tickets. It really could have been had.

Thinking about what could have really been involved in bringing some spirit of repentance to my heart. I thought of a Bible verse. “Do not deceive yourselves; God is not mocked; For whatever a man sows, that he will also reap” (Galatians 6:7).

When I do negative things, I will reap negative things. And I was about to harvest something very negative. But what makes the difference is acknowledging it and then regretting it.