Faith and Problem-Solving

It’s been a rough week, technologically speaking at my home. There were a few indications last week that things were not quite right–WiFi going off and on intermittently, but just sort of annoying stuff nothing major. That changed Sunday night–my internet was gone. When you have something that runs in the background of your life–you just take it for granted. It will always be there, but then its gone. I chose to be calm. I called my daughter whose husband is my IT guy, but he wasn’t available but after listening to me, she gave me some great words of advice. Call the company.

So I bucked up my courage, set myself for wait times and made the call. Fortunately my cell phone was still working so I could find the number! As I chatted with the person, she said, we will do a simple re-set from here. It will take about 10 minutes, would you like a re-call after that time to see if it worked. Sure, I said. I waited, but when the call came I couldn’t answer my cell phone. It kept ringing, but no place to answer. (User failure). A bit frustrated, I called the company again–waited through all the prompts when I got a text from them saying they had a text person to help me, they couldn’t call but just text me through it. So giving it the great try–I went for it. However, we just weren’t figuring it out that way. Finally, I received another call from the company–was able to answer it and they transferred me to a real person!

Her name is Faye and she is amazing! Her instructions were very clear, but given in small steps. I think she quickly figured out I wasn’t too knowledgeable on these things, but she let me ask questions along the way and we got to chat while we waited for buttons to light or various things she was doing on her end to help me work out. It took an hour and a half to get it working again, and to tell you the truth it didn’t all make sense to me, nor to her what made it work. What was supposed to be on my screen wasn’t, but finally all the right buttons lit up, all the problem lights went away and we were back on line in time for me to do some background study for the science class I was teaching in an hour! But I learned a lot. Faye’s confidence in what she knew and her abilities communicated to me that we would figure it out. She did not flaunt her knowledge or act superior making me feel stupid, she just quietly in the background problem solved my situation.

As I reflected on that time–I am so grateful for that patient woman who understood I didn’t know a lot about what she did. I simply followed her instructions whether they made sense to me or not, and we achieved the right results. God is like that. When we trust Him and His knowledge about the situations we face and simply follow his basic steps–we will achieve the breakthroughs we need. Because of her demeanor, it was easy to trust her. God is patient, kind, loving and at times firm in His instructions and I have learned over the years to trust Him.

But I also thought about our reactions to others. Are we patient? When we are helping others are we approachable? This woman was not condescending or frustrated with my questions. She was so good at her job. I want to follow her example when I am helping my grandchildren or others with things that I know. Teaching/leading with humility, grace and honor takes things to another level. I made the phone call to asking for help without frustration (even though it was a huge inconvenience for me) but I knew that it wouldn’t help me achieve the goal of re-connection if I carried my frustration out on them! It helped set the tone for the conversation as well. Let us remember to employ I Corinthians 13 in our relationship–it really does make a difference. Love is patient and kind. Love is not jealous or boastful or proud or rude. It does not demand its own way. It is not irritable, and it keeps no record of being wronged. It does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth winds out. Love never gives up, never loses faith, is always hopeful, and endures through every circumstance!

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