Change was in the air The house of Saul was fading; David was growing stronger by the day as more and more men declared their allegiance to him (I Chronicles 12). Among those who came over were “the men of Issachar who understood the times and knew what Israel should do” (I Chronicles 12:32).
We might romantically entertain the notion that change is good and we welcome it. We don’t. Changes that threaten our basic comfort zones are anathema. We are not eager to save (instead of spend), responding to our mate in a disputed area, losing five pounds or becoming more self-controlled.
Changes that Have Became Necessities We didn’t need Beethoven’s 5th until we had it. Now, we can’t imagine music without it. We didn’t need VCR’s or microwaves, but having experienced their convenience, we now view them as necessities. There’s no way to improve manual typewriters enough to make us give up our word processors. Change!
The American Auto Industry Should Have Changed When self-service, pump-your-own gas swept the nation, it was expensive to run wires under the concrete to each pump so as to program them. But it ending up paying off handsomely. “Service” stations neared extinction. Now oil change shops dot the land to specialize on what service stations used to do.
For years the Japanese had been capturing a larger and larger share of the American car market. Huge GM, resistant to change, did little, believing it would again come out on top as it has so many times before. GM chief, Roger Smith spoke about change, but did not change. In December, 1991, the giant announced they were losing 15 million dollars a day, so they were economizing by closing 23 plants and said 74,000 jobs would never come back. Ouch! In 2006, General Motors stock was declared “junk stock.” CEO Roger Smith was out. Smith’s resistance to change carried a high price.
To Be Continued (In the next blog post, we will look at the change from law to grace.)
I’m on the edge of my seat…