Short Stories

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TITLE: How to Dig Your ditch and Fall In
By David Butler
07/25/07



“Come into the office for a minute, Jim.”

Jim’s heart sank. Tensions between him and his boss had become worse lately.
What had he done, or not done this time?

Craig came to the point.

“Sorry to have to say it, Jim, but you’ve become an embarrassment to the company. We’ll have to terminate your contract, effective immediately.”

Jim sat there stunned. Cold fear started clawing at his guts. No job to go to and a substantial mortgage still to pay off. He and Sarah had prayed the night before that things would improve at work. They both felt that the answer was just around the corner.

“But…why? Can’t we talk these things through for once, instead of all these knee-jerk reactions?”

Craig had made up his mind. He was enjoying himself.

“We’ve talked about these issues many times, but you just won’t listen! I’ve had it with you hypocritical Christians! You don’t fit in with company culture. I’ve had complaints from employees who you’ve shamed into pulling down their girlie posters.”

Jim thought about all the female employees who thanked him for his stand, but said nothing. He knew it would be useless to argue with Craig on that.

“… not to mention your party-pooping behaviour at the Christmas break-up. So what’s wrong with a little game of spin-the-bottle? We had that gorgeous Gina all tanked up … but you HAD to put a stop to it, didn’t you?”

Yeah, and Gina thanked me for it later, came to church, got saved, and became the best secretary the GM ever had, thought Jim.

“You’re so full of your precious morality you don’t care about profits at all! Don’t you realize that we’ve lost that huge Moreland & Jones contract? All because you just HAD to tell the truth about our stock shortfall!”

That was too much for Jim. “But they appreciated our openness! They said so!”

“Now ain’t that just sooooo peachy!” sneered Craig. He jumped to his feet, glaring down at his victim.

“Appreciation ain’t any good to nobody if you lose the biggest contract we ever tendered for, you bonehead! Enough of this ****! You’re fired! Get out!”

Jim collected his things in a daze. All things work together for good… The promise seemed a bit empty now. How would Sarah, darling Sarah, take this?

She’d say all the supportive stuff of course; that he’d been sacked for taking a godly stand, persecuted for righteousness sake …… but she would be bleeding inside. Bless her heart!
But he couldn’t bring himself to be spiritual enough to rejoice about it – not yet anyhow.

*****

“Come in, Craig, take a seat,” said the GM.

Craig wondered why the GM called him. He usually left things in his capable hands. Craig preferred to keep him in the dark anyway, for various reasons. Well, he would soon learn about his firm handling of the errant Jim.

Mr. Masters seemed to be in a good mood.

“I’ll tell you the good news first: We won that tender with Moreland & Jones in the end.”

Craig gaped. How could they have accepted Jim’s submission after having bungled it so bad?

“Yes, Craig, they rang me personally to congratulate us for having such a professional as Jim. ‘A man we can trust!’ the State Manager said, ‘We’d prefer to work through him more than anyone else.’ They also liked Gina’s PowerPoint presentation I showed them. She’s amazing! We could do with more employees like those two. ”

Craig turned pale. He had once nearly sacked her when she had repelled his advances. He had some fast thinking to do.

“Uh…that’s a great pity, Mr Masters! Jim’s gone! He left for greener pastures. That’s OK. I’ll fill his post as liaison with…”

The GM was regarding him in an unnerving manner.

“That’s the fourth outstanding employee that’s left your department in a month. What’s going on, Craig?”

Craig, sweating, threw his arms wide. His private Jihad against Christians was coming back to bite him.

“Well, I …. I …. guess they think we’re not good enough for them. Yeah! Ambition! You’ve still got me!”

“Really? The not-so-good news is that we have just had an audit done on the books. There’s a lot of irregularities come to light that don’t look good. You have become an embarrassment to the firm, Craig. Get Jim back! You’ll be answerable to him in future – that is, IF you have a future here.”

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Psalm 7:15 “He made a pit, and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made.” (KJV)

© 2007

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