I have found over the years that God has a way of checking us. It happened to me this week. Integrity seemed to be the theme that kept popping up in my week.
Last Sunday’s sermon mentioned a righteous life, which involves integrity. The last blog I wrote was about the man who agreed to sell me an SUV but then reneged and sold it to someone else for $500 more than we had agreed upon. Why would I be surprised if something happened that would check my integrity? Our family has been in the candy business since I was a child. I don’t remember a lot about my early childhood, but I remember before going to kindergarten dad buying some cinnamon balls in bulk cases and some glass jars. I can remember counting out 200 cinnamon balls for each jar. I am sure dad made sure each jar contained at least 200. If you know much about me you know that I am a lover of Reese Cups. I could eat them every day and not tire of them. When Mom and Dad started their business Reese Cups came singles in a pack, 24 packs in a box. They sold at retail for a nickel. They bought them for .85 a box and sold them for .90 a box. The retailer made .30 a box and Cooper Wholesale made .05 a box. You had to sell a lot of boxes to make a living. I thought I knew a lot about the candy business, but I found out that there was more to learn this week. We got in six cases of Reese Cups in the last 10 days as part of a truckload of merchandise. I was notified by one of our employees that the date on the Reese Cups was short dated. The “best by” date on the side of the box was 7 12 23. I was already running a candy special for our customers by email so I sent an email indicating that we would sell these short dated Reese Cups at a significant discount. I also contacted the distributor from which we purchased the Reese Cups, seeking a discount because of the date of the candy. After much discussion with the distributor, I learned something that I had never known in the candy business. There are two ways of dating candy. One we might call the US dating and the other we might call International dating. In the US when we date something we date it month, day, year. So to me 7 12 23 would be July 12, 2023. Someone outside the US, however, would likely see 7 12 23 as the seventh day of December 2023. I also learned that Hershey dates US candy with only two digits, the month and the year. Hershey only dates international product with three digits. We received Reese Cups that were manufactured for either US or International shipment, but were dated international. Same product, same manufacturing plant in Pennsylvania. I was left with a double-edged dilemma. First to convince our customers that the short date isn’t short at all. These Reese Cups are fresh until December. Secondly, do I keep my word and give them the additional discount I offered them, thinking that they were short dated? How much is your soul worth? What is the price you’d put on your integrity? $500 more for a car or $5 less discount for a box of Reese Cups? There’s an old story about a millionaire who propositioned a beautiful model. She declined his advance. He then offered her a million dollars. Her response was, “give me some time to think about it.” His response was, “it apparently has nothing to do with your morals, only the price.” What is the price of losing my integrity? Hopefully even a million dollars wouldn’t be considered. Jesus said, “What does it profit a man to gain the whole world and lose his own soul?” I will be giving our customers the additional discount on very fresh Reese Cups.
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Chuck Cooper
Pastor at Daybreak Community Church Archives
November 2024
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