The requests for designer dresses, jeans, blouses, bathing suits, sweaters, boots, coats, jackets, handbags and jewelry are frequent.
Our girls work hard in the summer to save spending money for the school year. So I don't have a problem in honoring their requests. But they must give me a designer item in return to sell on eBay to offset costs. Tory Burch, Karlie, Lilly, LuLu, and Kate Spade are all OK with this arrangement.
Several weeks ago our oldest gave me a pair of RayBan sunglasses to sell in exchange for buying a pair of Tom Fords. Pretty straightforward, right?
I sold the sunglasses. The buyer paid. I shipped the item. Recorded the USPS tracking number on the item listing. The buyer says he never received the item. Even though the tracking number clearly shows they made it to his town. The sunglasses were lost in handling somewhere in Fayetteville, NC. Or were they? Something didn't add up.
I filed a case with eBay. Long and short of it? After 6 weeks eBay refunded the buyer $71.00. I had no sunglasses in return. On top of that the guy left me negative feedback for paying him to literally steal the glasses.
The world is mean. I don't know when it happened but life has changed. It took everything in me not to send him a very "colorful" message describing, in great detail, what I hoped would happen to him one day.
{And} then this verse came to mind:
"But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of
themselves, lovers of money,boastful, proud, abusive,disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather
than lovers of God"-2 Timothy 3:1-4
themselves, lovers of money,boastful, proud, abusive,disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather
than lovers of God"-2 Timothy 3:1-4
Paul tells us clearly, in 2 Timothy, what is going to happen in our world in the last days. He could not have been more accurate if he tried. He nailed it. And, yet, I'm still shocked when it happens to me.
I do not claim to have always gotten it right. Far from it. We've raised our kids under the simple premise "treat others the way you wish to be treated". Pretty much the standard golden rule. Our kids came home numerous times in grade school and middle school discouraged. Frustrated at the fact, unfortunately, that people raise mean kids.
What, however, do we do when we encounter such blatant dishonesty? Mean spirited people? How in the heck does God actually expect us to respond? Well, we are to respond in truth. No matter how bad the circumstance. Paul gives us very specific instructions on how we are to live.
"If anyone competes as an athlete, he does not win the prize unless he
competes according to the rules."-2 Timothy 2:3
competes according to the rules."-2 Timothy 2:3
Paul is telling us that if you are going to follow Christ you must be in training. All of your muscles must be perfected for competition. Your goal is to win the race ONLY if you do so by running the race honestly.We will win the ultimate prize of being face to face with our Savior one day soon. Keep competing, keep living but do so according to Christ.
No matter how upside down this world becomes we have hope. Hope in a cross that is right side up. That makes me feel so much better! Especially when I want to go to Fayetteville, NC and hunt someone down.
"By this the children of God and the children of the devil are obvious:
anyone who does not practice righteousness is not of God, nor the one
who does not love his brother."-1 John 3:10
