If there were labels in adulthood like the ones we had in the first grade, Lonny Poe, our pastor, would have fallen into the Bluebird Reading Group. His familiarity with words and his ability to yarn a story that captivates one's interest is a gift. Add to that his sense of humor and from my perspective, his giftedness expresses itself in many ways.
Yesterday in the introduction to his message, he talked about one of the challenges associated with flying. I probably never would approach this topic, but every detail he recounted has also been my experience. He briefly highlighted the difficulties associated with using public restrooms in airports.
I suspect if you've flown recently, you will have no difficulty identifying with his observation. He highlights some of the challenges associated to automation in public restrooms: automated flushers, automated sinks, automatic and automated soap dispensers, automated towel dispensers, and automated hand dryers.
Based on his experience, automation is not all that it is cracked up to be. He says this:
"For instance, if you go in the restroom and no one likes to do this when they are flying, you go in and close the stall door and you take out the little paper thing that you use to cover the seat. As you turn around, it flushes and pulls the paper seat protector down the drain."
"At the sink, at least in the line of faucets that are in large public restrooms, I don't know if it is only my experience or if its fairly universal, but there will be one or two that don't work no matter what you do. They are waiting for you to do the river dance in order for them to turn on. You put your hands under there and hurriedly move your hands back and forth under the faucet, it doesn't come on, but the adjacent faucet comes on. You quickly move to the other faucet and it goes off and the facet you left comes on.
"The soap dispenser is misery because it will dispense a little or a lot or it won't dispense at all. The other day, I moved my hand back and forth under the dispenser and I'm just rubbing and then all of a sudden, it unloads. I had just met the cleaning person – the custodian – as he was leaving out. And now there is white soap all over the black tile.
"I thought, well I can't leave that. So I went over there with a paper towel to whip it up and then it dropped on the back of my neck.
"The hand dryer must be a two way mirror with a 7th grade boy on the other side and he has the start and stop button and he is laughing his head off as your trying to do that.
"And then somebody, I don't know who, but they obviously have different rates of measurement – kind of like the United States and everybody else – a different rate of measurement for how much towel will be dispensed at any one time. So, at some point it is three inches and at other points you could wrap Christmas presents; it is that much.
"Bottom line, you go into the bathroom in a hurry, and you come out madder than a hornet. The experience is excruciating, and I get it – people are irresponsible. They are often thoughtless in public places and some are evidently raised in a barn. Enough water gets left on counters that you could float a pontoon at times. It is just that way…but the automation seems ineffective at best and frustrating at worst.
"All my joking aside, the image there sets the stage for the conversation because we know that no matter how much automation is integrated into life, it doesn't always work, and it never works 100%.
"The Spiritual life is in no way automatic – the spiritual life in Christ – the life we follow Jesus – God does some profound work in us, but it requires partnership from us. It requires a surrendered spirit. It requires attention from us. It requires work and choice."
Pastor Poe's message on Philippians 4 will enrich your life. Please give priority to thoughtfully listening to the message this week. The theme is "Standing Firm While We Wait."
All My Best!
Don
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