Just follow the directions

I just finished another online auction this week. It was another great auction with many local buyers, and we are shipping items all over America. This is the second auction in a row that saw someone drive a long ways to pick up their winnings that were not shippable. We had a man drive from Missouri to our auction center in Indiana to pick up the items he won. In our last auction we had a buyer drive from Texas to our auction center!

These online auctions are fun, but there is one thing that troubles me at every auction: people who don't read the information that clearly states the terms of the sale. Every auction clearly, in several places, gives the day, time and location for people to pick up their winning items, and yet there are 7-8 people in every auction who call or send an email asking when they can pick up their items and where are we located. We explain clearly that we do not have their credit card information on file and people can pay by check, cash or credit when they pick up their items. Still, in every sale there will be several who tell us they assume we automatically charged their card when they won the bid. Numerous times in the listing it explains that pick up is on Wednesday, the day after the sale closes, but on Tuesday night after the sale people will start sending emails explaining they can't pick up their items on Tuesday because they will be out of state or have an appointment to have their dog groomed or some other excuse. That means we have to work around their items in our small auction center while setting up for the next sale. It gets quite frustrating.

Of course, it's not just auction buyers who fail to read the terms of the sale. A lot of Christians never bother to read the Bible, or if they do read it they somehow believe it doesn't apply to them. There is no better guidebook for helping people understand how to live their lives, but many of us feel like we can ignore it and never suffer any consequences. If a preacher dares to proclaim, "Thus sayeth the Lord...." there's a good chance he or she won't be around next week. Prophets were not very popular in biblical times; they are less popular today.

How long has it been since you've engaged in serious Bible study? The Bible is not a book of theory. It doesn't contain suggestions that might help you live a better life. This is a guidebook given to us by God and designed to help us live the life He intends. We don't get to pick and choose what parts of the Bible we'll follow and which parts we'll ignore and not experience any consequences. I'll be the first to admit some of the things the Bible tells us we are to do can be difficult, but if we'll just follow the directions we will find life will become much better.