Mind Your Manners!

"Will that be all?" the clerk asked rather disinterestedly as I put a couple of items for my husband on the counter in the men's department of a major store.

"Well, actually, I was looking for pajamas for my granddaughter, but I couldn't find any.  I looked all over for a clerk, but I couldn't find one anywhere!" I said.

"Yeah, we're really short on help today," he replied resignedly.  That was putting it mildly!  One could go halfway around the store without seeing an employee.

"That's some attitude!" Howard said as we walked away.  Well, maybe the economy's down, I thought, but more likely they were concerned about the bottom line and cutting down on employee hours; after all this  was a Saturday with sales going on.  But it reminded me of the day I was checking out at a drugstore not long ago.  The label  on a container (I forget now what) said, 2/$5.  Well, I only wanted one.  Then I saw a sign in front of a box of chocolates that said 17 oz. box, $1.  But the box wrapper said it contained only 14 oz.

"I know these are two for five dollars," I said to the cashier, "but according to law that I read, I should be able to get one for $2.50.  And this box of candy only contains 14 ounces, not 17."  The disagreeable looking woman said loudly in her most exaggerated, uncouth voice, "WELL, CAW-LL THE LAW-W!!." I think I put the items back, on principle.

Whatever happened to courtesy and "the customer is always right," philosophy?  Just a sign of the general deterioration of manners in our society. 

Last night our pastor was preaching on love, and he mentioned courtesy and civility, which is so often absent today.  "Why is it so hard to love, and even to be civil and courteous?" he asked.  Answering his own question, he referenced a scripture in Jeremiah 17:9, which says, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"  He also read John 3:19, which tells us men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.

But as Christians, we are admonished in Ephesians 5:1,2, to "Be ye followers of God, as dear children; (2) And walk in love, as Christ also hath loved us, and hath given himself for us an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling savour."

I found the pjs I wanted at the next store, and even a nightie for little sister, as well.  This time, I got a friendly cashier who commented that they were cute.  I pointed to the pink pajamas and said, "This one's having a birthday, but I just had to get something for this one, too," pointing to the smaller sleepwear, to which she acknowledged with a smile,  "I know, I do that, too!"

It is so easy to walk in love when it's children that we are loving, but the challenge is to be sweet-smelling  to our fellowman!