Fat-finger Dialing
Stories
Lectionary Tales For The Pulpit
Series IV Cycle C
Thanksgiving Day
Philippians 4:4-9
Fat-finger Dialing
"Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God." (v. 6)
I reach for the phone and punch in 1-555-274-2406.
I then get a series of options offered by a cyber-voiced human clone for a company called International Publishing. Oops! That's not who I wanted. I had inverted the last two digits of the number. I hang up and call again. But that mistake will cost me a couple bucks.
Joel Drizin of New York City put in a call to his brother in New Jersey using one of the nation's long-distance carriers and his four-minute call cost him $16.42 because he misdialed his access number and ended up with a different carrier. A call that should have cost him about $6 instead cost him about $10 more. He filed a lawsuit charging "deceptive business practices."
Misdialing or misspelling phone numbers is known in the industry as "fat-finger dialing." It's a problem because there are more than ninety phone numbers very close to toll-free numbers, that are managed by companies that charge as much as three times the amount charged by AT&T, for example.
Here's how it works. You intend to call 1-800-CALL-ATT, but instead you dial 1-800-CALL-LAT. Instead of AT&T, you are connected with ASC Telecom and you are allegedly charged at a much higher rate and you don't even know about it since you are unaware that you misdialed and that you got a different long distance carrier.
The problem is so serious that the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau has issued warning bulletins to consumers along with a procedure to use to file a complaint.
You already know where I'm going with this.
In our communication with God, there is no fat-finger dialing. "Not to worry," Paul says (v. 6). We're not going to get a wrong number. We are not going to be charged excessive fees.
But we must dial.
Regrettably, many of us do not dial in too often. Prayer is not high on our list of things to do. Like these two men who obviously were not in top praying form.
The first challenged the other, "If you are so religious, let's hear you quote the Lord's Prayer. I bet you $10 you can't."
The second responded, "Now I lay my down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. And if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take."
The first pulled out his wallet and fished out ten bucks, muttering, "I didn't think you could do it!"
That's fat-finger prayer dialing!
When we do pray our "prayers and supplications," we should -- with thanksgiving -- let God know what we need.
That's all there is to it.
And that's something to be thankful for.
Philippians 4:4-9
Fat-finger Dialing
"Do not worry about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God." (v. 6)
I reach for the phone and punch in 1-555-274-2406.
I then get a series of options offered by a cyber-voiced human clone for a company called International Publishing. Oops! That's not who I wanted. I had inverted the last two digits of the number. I hang up and call again. But that mistake will cost me a couple bucks.
Joel Drizin of New York City put in a call to his brother in New Jersey using one of the nation's long-distance carriers and his four-minute call cost him $16.42 because he misdialed his access number and ended up with a different carrier. A call that should have cost him about $6 instead cost him about $10 more. He filed a lawsuit charging "deceptive business practices."
Misdialing or misspelling phone numbers is known in the industry as "fat-finger dialing." It's a problem because there are more than ninety phone numbers very close to toll-free numbers, that are managed by companies that charge as much as three times the amount charged by AT&T, for example.
Here's how it works. You intend to call 1-800-CALL-ATT, but instead you dial 1-800-CALL-LAT. Instead of AT&T, you are connected with ASC Telecom and you are allegedly charged at a much higher rate and you don't even know about it since you are unaware that you misdialed and that you got a different long distance carrier.
The problem is so serious that the Consumer & Governmental Affairs Bureau has issued warning bulletins to consumers along with a procedure to use to file a complaint.
You already know where I'm going with this.
In our communication with God, there is no fat-finger dialing. "Not to worry," Paul says (v. 6). We're not going to get a wrong number. We are not going to be charged excessive fees.
But we must dial.
Regrettably, many of us do not dial in too often. Prayer is not high on our list of things to do. Like these two men who obviously were not in top praying form.
The first challenged the other, "If you are so religious, let's hear you quote the Lord's Prayer. I bet you $10 you can't."
The second responded, "Now I lay my down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. And if I die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take."
The first pulled out his wallet and fished out ten bucks, muttering, "I didn't think you could do it!"
That's fat-finger prayer dialing!
When we do pray our "prayers and supplications," we should -- with thanksgiving -- let God know what we need.
That's all there is to it.
And that's something to be thankful for.
