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When the urbane and successful jewellery chain
owner Jerald Ratner stood up on a Friday evening to make a routine speech
at the Institute of Directors in 1991 he had no idea that he would make
one joke that would see his Jewellery empire virtually collapse by Monday
morning. £500m was wiped from the value of the company because he made
a joke about some of their earrings costing less than an M&S prawn sandwich,
though probably not lasting as long. It must have seemed like a good
idea at the time.
"Doing a Ratner" has passed into the vocabulary meaning to make a colossal
gaffe. Another example of someone 'doing a Ratner' is David Shepherd
who, as brand director of clothing chain Topman, described his customers
as 'hooligans'. He went on to remark, 'Very few of our customers have
to wear suits to work. They'll be for their first interview or first
court case.' How they must have laughed back at the board meeting.
People can be like that. We like to think of ourselves as urbane, sophisticated,
wise and sensible. Then we open our mouths, make decisions, give our
well-considered opinions, tell our jokes and we so often end up looking
the fools we were sure five minutes ago we could never be.
I never cease to be amazed at the folly of humankind. Stand at the counter
of any local shop and look up at the cigarette display. Row upon row
of little boxes emblazoned with the warnings, "SMOKING KILLS", "SMOKING
CAUSES HEART DISEASE", "SMOKING CAN SERIOUSLY DAMAGE YOUR HEALTH", and
yet people still smoke. I remember when almost everyone smoked and I
am sure it must have seemed a good idea at the time.
Standing at the same counter you will likely see people buying lottery
tickets. Now you have more chance of getting hit by a falling elephant
but people still buy the tickets and watch the draw and convince themselves
that they were only "two numbers short this week" even though the mathematics
makes them liars. I even saw just today gadgets you can buy that look
like a set of roulette wheels you spin to help you pick your "lucky
numbers" this week. Now you are not only relying on blind chance to
make your fortune you are spending more money on a gadget that will
"choose" the numbers you will offer the god of good fortune. I am sure
to many it seems like a good idea.
I am not moralising and assure you that, as a family man, I am surrounded
by people more than happy to remind me of my own follies (and they are
many). I simply wish to point out that it is from this pool of pioneering
genius and social sophistication come the razor sharp minds that challenge
my Christian faith. I confess that I am not intimidated and neither
should any thinking Christian.
That is not to say we should behave with contempt towards others. Only
that we need to understand who we are dealing with and what confidence
we can have in the good news of Jesus Christ and all that God is doing
in us.
We know that, "There is a way that seems
right to a man, but in the end it leads to death" (Prov.14:12)
We also know:
The man without the Spirit does not accept the things that come from
the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him, and he cannot understand
them, because they are spiritually discerned. The spiritual man makes
judgements about all things, but he himself is not subject to any man's
judgement: 'For who has known the mind of the Lord that he may instruct
him?' But we have the mind of Christ (1 Cor.2:14-16)
This does not mean that there are not people who are smarter than we
are, better able in many ways. It does mean that only those who have
the mind of Christ may discern the things of God and that those who
do not enjoy such spiritual blessing must not intimidate us. We respect
those who think differently and value their rich gifts and abilities
but in the things of God we can more than stand our ground.
Let's walk this week determined to "keep
till the end the confidence we had at first" (Heb.3:14)
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