3327 Text Messages

Have you ever opened up a bill and noticed that there was a glaring, unmistakable error. At least you hoped that there was a glaring, unmistakable error. It happened to me this week.

On Saturday, my cell phone bill arrived (I won’t tell you what cell phone company it is, but I’ll give you some clues: The headquarters for this company is in Overland Park; several fine Centralites work for this company; and, its name rhymes with “squint.”) Anyway, I received my bill and much to my surprise, it said I owed this fine company an eye popping $691.19. Here’s a general rule I live by: if your cell phone bill is higher than the cost of a plasma TV, you’ve got a problem.

I had a problem.

Upon investigation I discovered that $574.60 of that bill was my #1 cherub’s text messaging bill. Alex, during the billing period, had received and sent a grand total of 3,327 text messages. How can anyone send and receive 3,327 text messages? I love my son, but I don’t believe I spoke to him 3,327 times in the last year—maybe not in his lifetime. 3,327? Are you kidding me?!?

Here’s the whole story: On our cell phone bill, from the month prior to the Super Colossal Bill of $691.19, Alex had gone over his text messaging limit and it cost him something like $14.95. Knowing that to have unlimited text messaging was $15.00 a month, my astute math whiz decided that he should have unlimited text messaging for a nickel more. So he and Karla went to the local cell phone office that rhymes with “flint” and changed his coverage from 1000 text messages a month to unlimited text messages a month. Unfortunately, the employee at the cell phone office that rhymes with “mint” must have typed in the wrong information or hit the wrong button, because instead of having unlimited test messaging we had no text messaging coverage. Hence, our cell phone bill was for $691.19.

As you might imagine, quicker that you can say “Can you hear me now?” I called the cell phone company that rhymes with “Splint” and said: “I think we have a problem.” Jessica was the name of the friendly cell phone employee on the other end of the line (Is it correct to say “the other end of the line” when referring to a cell phone company? Probably not.). Anyway, Jessica informed me that my $691.19 bill was over her limit to authorize an adjustment. She was sympathetic. She was nice. But she could not do anything about my bill. I told her a $691.19 bill was over my limit too. She said she was sorry and that she would fill out some form (I assume it was a form for people who were about to text message “I owe a crazy amount of money to a phone company!” to the whole wide world) and that a representative from the company that rhymes with “tint” would call me on Monday.

I waited on Monday. All day I waited. Finally, I could wait no longer and called the company that rhymes with “Lint” and said: “We’ve still got a problem.” This time I spoke to a fine employee named Troy. Troy told me we had no problem. He said that my $691.19 cell phone bill had already been adjusted, and that my worried son no longer had to figure out how many driveways he would have to snow shovel to come up with the $691.19. Whew! Thank You, Jessica. Thank you, Troy. Thank you cell phone company that rhymes with “Clint,” as in “Eastwood,” because just like Dirty Harry they “made my day!”

Why did I tell you all of this?

The phone bill was an honest mistake, which the phone company quickly rectified. In life, I had a much bigger problem than a $691.21 phone bill. My debt was huge. It was a mile long. It was a million miles long. It was the type of debt that on my own I could in no way clear up. And no cell phone employee (even with the proper authorization) could clear it up either. My “sin” record could only be cleared by a savior. And that’s the good news of Christmas. The glorious message of the angel to Joseph in the Christmas story was mine and your good news too. The Angel told Joseph: “You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.” (Matthew 1:21). I need Jesus. So do you. Jesus came to this world to save people from their sins. That’s exactly what I need, and that is the ultimate message of Christmas. A savior came. His name is Jesus!

Now, that’s a message we could “text” to 3,327 of our closest friends!