We have issues with our mailman — or mailwoman, or mailperson, or letter-carrier, whatever the politically correct term is these days. We regularly get our next-door neighbor’s mail, and we strongly suspect our own mail is being mishandled as well. When we get three bills from the same utility provider on the same day, that’s a sign there’s a wrench in the works somewhere.
I am told that this is considered by the United States Postal Service to be what you might call a manageable problem. That is to say, they would fix it if it wouldn’t interfere with more important issues — like, as likely is the case here, getting employees clocked out on time. But it will interfere, so it won’t get fixed.
This bit of knowledge redirected my angst somewhat. There’s no point in getting upset with the letter-carrier if she is just doing what her supervisor requires her to do. If she were to slow down and make sure she got it right like we want — and, to be fair, what she does on her own most of the time — she might get fired. My issue is with a system that would allow this sort of problem to exist in the first place.
I don’t know if the solution is new regulations or renegotiated union contracts or robots in self-driving cars, and I don’t care. I just want my mail delivered properly.
I try to take the same kind of attitude toward my worldly neighbors. They don’t always make it easy. But my warfare is not against them; it is against “the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 6:12). I’m not upset at sinners. I’m upset at their prince (John 12:31).