Count the Cost

Something my dad taught me at a very early age is how to count money. I’m not talking about how to count what you have in your hand. I’m talking about how to calculate how much change is to be given. I might be telling my age by saying this, but when I was young you didn’t have the luxury of being able to click on the picture of an item the customer wanted, or scan a barcode, or type in the amount of money someone gave you so the register could tell you how much change to give them back. No, you had to memorize all the prices and you had to mentally calculate how much change they were due. Not only that, but we never counted out a person’s change to them forward, we always counted it out backward – from the amount they spent back to the amount they originally surrendered. 

Well, obviously, the young man who checked me out at the store yesterday wasn’t aware of the intense training that was instilled in me at a young age. As his side of the register clearly instructed him how much change he was to give me, I stood there and watched him as he mentally wrestled with the ethics of the decision he was about to make. The decision he decided to make was to short-change me. As he placed all the money in my hand without even counting it out, forward nor backward, I continued to stand there with my hand open – hopeful he would make the right decision and reconcile his intentional wrong. But to my dismay, his one word to me was, “What?” as he shrugged his shoulders and tried to look confused. I simply responded, “You know what,” and suddenly his look of confusion turned to one of guilt as he opened the register to give me the rest of my change.

Months ago I had already said I was going to stop going to that store because it seems like every time I go in there there’s something. When I got in my car, I so wanted to call my sister and tell her what had just happened. But praise God for that still, small voice that said, “Keidra, let it go.” So, instead of making that phone call, I drove down the road to the gas station to top off my tank.

When I looked at my gas gage, I knew about twenty dollars should fill it the rest of the way up. So, I got my money out, went inside to pay, and came out to pump my gas. Once I got the pump going, I sat in my car until it stopped. It was at $19.48. Now, I know they say you shouldn’t try to pump past the point where it automatically cuts off, but surely fifty-two cents would be okay. So, I started pumping again, fully expecting it to start slowing down as it approached the twenty-dollar mark. Not only did it not slow down, but it actually flew right past twenty dollars! When it got to $20.50, I stopped the pump, closed my tank, and went back inside.

When I approached the same young lady who I had given my money to, she looked at my pump and went to give me change back. Before she could get it out of the register, I asked her, “How much did I give you?” She said, “A ten and two fives.” I waited for a few seconds to see if it would click. It didn’t. She said, “You had thirty on pump seven, right?” I asked her again, “Now, what did you say I gave you?” “You gave me a ten and two fives.” As she stood there and looked at me, I paused for just a second trying to figure out what I needed to say and how to say it nicely. Then finally something within her clicked, as she exclaimed, “Oh!” followed by an immediate “Oh, wow!” as she and the woman standing behind me stood there in disbelief at the thought that I didn’t take the change. Then, when I handed her fifty cents, she really didn’t know what to say.

It wasn’t until I got back to my car that I realized I had just experienced the same test the young man who checked me out at the previous store had faced. When the pump kept pumping, I had a decision to make. When the cashier went to give me change back, I had a decision to make. When she simply responded, “Oh, wow!” and never asked me for the fifty cents I went over, I had a decision to make. Had I made any other decision than the ones I made, I would have been just as guilty as the young man who intentionally short-changed me.

Even though others may wrong us, it doesn’t give us the okay to wrong somebody else. While we may be able to pull a fast one over on another person, there is nothing we could ever do fast enough to escape the watchful eye of God. While we may think we’re gaining something now, we’re actually forfeiting something way more valuable in the future. So I encourage each of you to not only learn how to count money, but I also urge you before you make any decision, to always count the cost.

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