day 1133: Shutdowns

"Praise the Lord, the God of Israel, who lives from everlasting to everlasting. Amen and amen!"

Experiencing a shutdown is inevitable.  We have all had it happen and we will have it happen again.  It could be as simple as a favorite restaurant shutting down, or the dry cleaner going out of business, or our favorite TV show being cancelled.  It can also be quite painful when an expensive product we own no longer gets serviced or gets shut down. If you own a Fisker electric car you certainly know what this means. In a few months, on July 1, Google will shut down Reader. Is this cataclysmic like it might feel like when the local school gets shuttered because of budget cuts, probably not, but if you liked, used and depended on Reader, then there will be a certain amount of pain and inconvenience you will feel and probably a little grief too when it finally disappears.  Last month I was in negotiation to purchase an online service that I love and depend on heavily that will soon be shutdown if no other suitor comes along (I so wanted to make the deal, but couldn’t bring it together).  What we hope from companies is that when they shutdown or discontinue a service or product that they give us lots of warning, more than we think we need, and then over communicate with us on what we can expect and when. Google giving the amount of notice they did was great.  There is plenty of time to find other ways to manage one’s RSS needs. I’m not a Reader user, but I suspect that if I Googled how to manage RSS feeds that Google will be directing us to other great services.  The consumer relationship is a tricky one and when loyalty occurs we have to be ready to live up to what comes with it, in the good, the bad and the shutdown times.

How blessed we are to know that there will never be a shutdown of God’s love, grace and mercy over us. It is only us that create shutdowns with God and that is when we pull the plug or put something else between us and Him. I often wonder what it must feel like to God to have so much love for us and then have us turn our back or deny Him the love back.  When we aren’t living and working in a way that is extending and furthering His glory in all that we do, it is like we are shutting Him down. Consider how it is that we are working in our jobs that is shutting Him out and down?  Our words? Our actions? Our pride? Our actions toward others?  Let’s not be ones who create a shutdown!

Reference: Psalm 41:13 (New Living Translation)