All posts by Keith Thompson

Time and chance

Career, Life

My Sunday school teacher (David Smith) taught a lesson a few weeks ago that really grabbed my attention. The scripture was written by King Solomon (King David’s son) and he was the wisest and richest man to ever live. Literally. He authored three books of the bible, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes and The Song of Solomon. These three books follow the book of Psalms which was written by his father, King David.

Ecclesiastes is shockingly applicable to today. It is like the book was written last week even though it was written 935 years before Christ. I want to focus on the false idea that we (as humans) can control our life by our own education, wisdom, strength, skill or wealth. Look at the following passage of scripture.

Ecclesiastes 9:11 (NLT) “I have observed something else under the sun. The fastest runner doesn’t always win the race, and the strongest warrior doesn’t always win the battle. The wise sometimes go hungry, and the skillful are not necessarily wealthy. And those who are educated don’t always lead successful lives. It is all decided by chance, by being in the right place at the right time,”

If you are like me, I haven’t yet been able to wrap my mind around all the meaning of that verse. It is so deep. What part I do understand, I understand very deeply. It says to me that we can do all the right things and still fail because it is up to God to put us in the right place at the right time. This is clearly the story of my life and maybe yours too. Only God knows where we are supposed to be and only God can ordain the circumstances to line up in our lives.

The message is simple. Seek God’s will and his favor and trust that he has us in his hand and he will put us in the right place at the right time. We have no control. When we accept that, it allows us to live more freely and have more love, joy and peace. It’s funny, that the words love, joy and peace are used mostly at Christmas time. Merry Christmas. KT

S&H Green Stamps

Career

Before Amazon, eBay, Google and the internet, there was S&H Green Stamps. The company started in 1896 but really came into its own in the 50’s and 60’s. Grocery stores, gas stations etc. would buy the stamps (green with a sticky back) from S&H and then give them out to customers based on the amount they spent. The customers would paste them into S&H books and could redeem them for merchandise at the S&H Green Stamp stores or through the Green Stamp catalog.

One book of stamps was 24 pages of 50 stamps and each stamp represented 10 cents spent. Therefore, each book represented roughly $120.00 spent. We are talking about the 50’s and 60’s when gas was 25 cents a gallon, new cars were $2,500 and the average weekly grocery bill was $30 dollars. Therefore, to get one book of stamps it was like a month worth of purchases. By way of examples, a men’s Bulova watch was 10 books, a silverware set was 27 books, a wall clock was 9 books, an ice cream maker was 4 books and a mixing bowel set was 1 book. Housewives would save stamps for year to redeem them for something they could have bought for $15-$20 dollars.

At their peak, S&H had 800 Green Stamp stores where people would bring the books they saved and trade them for merchandise. They also printed more than 30 million catalogs where people could redeem their books for merchandise through the mail.

People would pay more for their groceries just to get the green stamps and like many loyalty programs today, people would purchase from the same gas station or grocery store because they saw value in these stamps. They could have probably bought the items for a fraction of what they spent at these stores just to get the green stamps.

It was its own industry and the green stamp owners (Sperry and Hutchinson) were making a killing on the stamp program. It all came crashing down in the mid 70’s when several trade associations claimed that the program was unfair to the consumers by making them pay more for goods and services than the stamps were worth. Also, Walmart was expanding like crazy and other discount retailers arrived which exposed how much more consumers were paying at certain stores just to get the stamps. Like many businesses, it had a great run and great following but did not adapt to the changing market place.

There are literally thousands of companies that lost their market edge because they either refused to change or couldn’t see the reason for a change. Two perfect examples of this would be Sears and Blackberry. They both literally owned their respective market but ultimately lost their customer base because they didn’t adapt to change. Whatever business you are in (literally) is going to change and the future is to those who can see it and change with it. KT

Little house slippers

Family, Life

We had a family get together this past weekend with my brothers and sister and all the children. Our granddaughters have their own rooms at our house for when they spend the night and they have clothes, toys etc. and it is their own space.

At some point that night my youngest granddaughter had gone up to her room and put on her house slippers and came back down to the party. When she left to go home, she changed back into her shoes and left her house slippers by my chair.

That evening I couldn’t sleep and got up to go read for a while and when I turned on my reading light by my chair I looked down and saw her little house slippers. Its funny how some things just stop you in your tracts. That night those little house slippers did that to me.

I realized at the moment how precious life is and how fast it goes by. When I saw those shoes, I thought about when my own daughters would leave their shoes downstairs and how that seemed like just a couple of years ago. Here I am looking my granddaughter’s shoes 30 years later. I was struck with a feeling of nostalgia and awareness of how fast time gets by. One day you wake up and realize that 20 years have passed while you were busy.

Getting older is scary. You began to think about things and events that you used to never think about. You were too busy living it and didn’t realize how quick those moments slip by. This Christmas look at the little house slippers (metaphorically) in your life and remind yourself of the best of life and what is important. The new phone, car or bank account do not compare to the importance of a little pair of slippers to remind you what matters most in your life. There will come a day in all our lives when there are no little slippers on the floor. Cherish each moment and be there in that moment. I think this may be the best gift we could give ourselves this Christmas. The gift of being aware. KT

Life is like a pair of shoes

Life

I heard a story about a boy who was given a beautiful pair of expensive sneakers. He was so afraid he would mess them up that he kept them in the box. One day he decided to wear them and realized that he had outgrown them. He never got to enjoy them because he was afraid he would mess them up.

In many ways, our life is like the story of the pair of shoes. We have been hurt in the past and afraid to use our heart to believe again. In essence, we keep our hearts safe in a box, so we don’t have to take the risk of it getting hurt.

Whatever failures, hurts and life missteps you have made in the past will not define your future unless you let it. You might want to read that last sentence again. I could take the next five pages and tell you about the mistakes financially I have made but I can also tell you I was fully prepared to keep failing and keep getting hurt in order to find the path God had for me.

Thomas Edison failed 1,000+/- times before he invented the light bulb. When asked by a reporter “how did it feel to fail 1,000 times?” he replied “I didn’t fail 1,000 times. The light bulb was an invention with 1,000 steps.” As a child, Thomas Edison couldn’t speak until he was four years old and couldn’t read until he was seven. His life was always challenged but he never quit trying. At the end of his life, Thomas Edison owned 1,093 patents.

So, my point is that shoes, like a heart, need to be worn because if not, you will one day find out that you have outgrown them. Keeping them in a box because you are afraid is no way to live. Make this Christmas season merry and bright by choosing to take your heart out of its protective box even though it may get bruised up a little. KT

The power of words

Family, Life

Words are perhaps the most powerful thing in the world. It was words, that God used to form the world and it has been words that set in motion ever major event in history. Words are critically important for the ones hearing them but just as important for the one speaking them. Words heard or spoken, go straight to the soul and many times set in motion the course of life. Clearly there are situations where people/children have been told they will never amount to anything and that they have no value etc. Even in those tough situations, it was the spoken words (negative words) that forced the person to make a decision to rise above them and become somebody.

For many people, they never had a parent tell them that they loved them and believed in them and that they could accomplish anything they set their mind to. There are others that had only one parent that believed in them which was true in my case. It was my mom. Clearly, just the spoken word is not enough to change a life as there also must be decisions made by the ones hearing the words. But make no mistake. it is words that set the stage and in many situations start in motion the events of life.

While history has no record of this, I must believe that Nancy Lincoln, Morrow Graham, Muriel Waley, Pauline Einstein, Sara Roosevelt, Francis Nightingale, Alberta King and Cassandra Austen told their children that they believed in them and that they were loved. See, it was not them that changed the world, rather it was their children. Ps; see if you can guess the children’s name. A few are obvious but you might have to dig deep on a couple.

There is power in words and a special power and influence in the words of a parent. This Christmas when you are speaking to your children and grandchildren, regardless of age, tell them in actual words what they mean to you and give them words of affirmation, encouragement and let them know you believe in them. KT