The book that happened to be handy was Michael Crichton´s ”The Lost World” – and yes, I still read a lot, and all kinds of books….

In that book one of the characters, Ian Malcolm, once discusses changes in  behavior as a possible reason for mass extinction events in the past. It goes something  like this: ””I´m talking about all the order in the natural world! Change can emerge fast, because complex animals can evolve their behavior rapidly. Now we humans are transforming the planet, without knowing if it is a dangerous development or not. Evolution in behavioral processes can happen fast, much faster than we think!

In ten thousand years human beings have gone from hunting, to farming, to cities, to cyberspace. Our behavior is screaming forward, and it might be nonadaptive, no one knows!

Althought personally I think cyberspace means the end of our species. This idea to get the whole world wired together means mass death! Every biologist knows that small groups in isolation evolve adaptive behavior fastest. You put a thousand birds on an isolated island, and they evolve very fast in this way. You put a million on a big continent, and it all slows down.

Look at us humans! Our evolution occurs through our behavior. We innovate new behaviour to adapt to changes in our environment. But innovation occurs only in small groups!  Put three people on a committee, and they might get something done. Ten people, and it gets much harder. Thirty people, and nothing happens! With thirty millions it is already impossible.

That´s the effect of mass media: it keeps adaptive behavior from happening. Mass media swamps diversity! It makes every place on earth the same! Regional differences vanish. In the mass media world there is less of everything!

People worry about losing species diversity in the rainforest, but what about intellectual diversity, the thing needed for our ability to adapt our behavior in order to survive? That is disappearing faster than the trees! And now we are planning p to put five billion people together in cyberspace! That will freeze our entire species! Everyone will think the same thing at the same time, global conformity! Extinction does not require asteroids or diseases, all that is needed is fatal changes in behavior….”

The book is written thirty years ago….

I have been thinking a lot about the coming Apocalypse, and I have come to the conclusion that we, at least in some ways, are going to cause it ourselves by destroying the very planet on which we are living. I have thought that this will happen through nuclear war and poisoning of the biosphere, global warming and so on, and this because we are too stupid and evil to prevent it.

Chrichton offers a way of thinking that might be right on spot. It is all about behavior, destructive mass behavior, that is made conform by mass media and internet, the very same instruments that suffocate and silence every voice that tries to talk reason.

Heard the word cancel culture? How do the world choose who is to be canceled? Through social media, mass media, trendings on the internet! What an positively devilish instrument to create and sustain lethal mass behavior!

So, as a Christian I think I shall continue to be very suspicious when it comes to what ”everybody” thinks and says, and to how human behavior changes in the world! Changes, as our concepts of good and evil,  and what is morally right or wrong, changes…..

I liked the song then, because the lyrics spoke volumes of strength of will, independence, and ”I don´t give a damn what people think or say” to my youthful and rebellious nature.

It still speaks to me, but in a different way now.

Nowadays it makes me think of Isaiah 53, where the mother of all sin is described.

”All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned everyone to his own way”.

”To his own way”.

”I´d like to live my life ”my way”, to do this and that  ”my way”, in my opinion everything ought to be the way I like it, this is what I want, regardless of what is said in the Bible” – that´s what we human beings are hearing every day from our three best friends: ”Me”, ”Myself” and ”I”…

Maybe that´s why a song like ”My Way” became so popular?

Because it describes so well what man wants to be and do?

To never have to kneel to anyone, to have no regrets, to be strong enough to always stand tall in defence of one´s own rights, and at last be able to face the end with full confidence that I did nothing wrong, I don´t need to apologize for the way I have lived, least of all I need anybody´s forgiveness!

Good as it may sound in our ears, this is still the attitude and way of living that brought mankind into such a dead end, that Jesus had to come and take all our iniquity, all the rotten fruits of all our myways, upon Himself

A lot of people have taken their myway-attitude to such extremes that they actually tries to elevate themselves to be God´s equals in order to not have to bow down to any higher authority.

I say this because anyone, who claims to know how to discern evil from good, who wants to be the one who decides where the borderline between right and wrong, accepable and unacceptable should be drawn, is taking the place of God.

And there are Christians, who give God a little space in their lives, and no more, a little religious bubble, that is safely closed off from the decisions of life and choices of future paths, since they still want to have their own way in so many things.

To put it bluntly, what they are thinking, maybe not consciously, but still are thinking is a ”If God wants the same as I want, then I´ll do as God wants, but if God don´t want what I want, then I´ll do as I want!”

Which, of course, also is the same as taking the place of God for oneself.

Well, here is the lyrics of ”My Way”.

As accurate a description of man´s rebellion, pride, and futile attempt to serve as his own god, even to the point where his creed becomes a ”If I don´t own myself, if I´m not in control, then I have nothing!” as I have ever heard!

”And now, the end is near;
And so I face the final curtain.
My friend, Ill say it clear,
I´ll state my case, of which Im certain.

I´ve lived a life thats full.
I´ve traveled each and every highway;
And more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Regrets, I´ve had a few;
But then again, too few to mention.
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption.

I planned each charted course;
Each careful step along the byway,
But more, much more than this,
I did it my way.

Yes, there were times, I´m sure you knew

When I bit off more than I could chew.
But through it all, when there was doubt,
I ate it up and spit it out.
I faced it all and I stood tall;
And did it my way.

Ive loved, Ive laughed and cried.
Ive had my fill; my share of losing.
And now, as tears subside,
I find it all so amusing.

To think I did all that;
And may I say – not in a shy way,
No, oh no not me,
I did it my way.

For what is a man, what has he got?
If not himself, then he has naught.
To say the things he truly feels;
And not the words of one who kneels.
The record shows I took the blows -
And did it my way! ”

There is no end to all the different opinions, statements, warnings and not always too wellfounded information that a retired preacherman seems to be supposed to look up and evaluate.

Nowadays most of the questions I get touches on covid19, covidvaccines, and how we as Christians are supposed to act, if this be the end of time and the number of the Beast..

Since I am an old man, having in the past been fooled into believing things without having the good sense to check dem up first a little too many times, I nowadays  have taken the opposite approach, being more inclined to not believe in anything, before I´m sure it is worth believing in.

And, let me be clear,  I do not approve of the kind of fear-mongering that is going on in some quarters!

We should preach Christ and his salvation, and his coming, remind each other of his words, that we are to rejoice and lift our heads when it gets darker in this world, instead of whining about how our personal liberties are restricted if we cannot do everything everywhere in any way at any time like we have been used to!

Unfortunately  there is a lot of unreliable information out there, and a lot of people that are ready to pass it on without a second thought – but, since I get my fair share of questions according to it, there also seem to be a good many people who really want to know what can be trusted and what not!

One can only hope that their number will increase….

But, the problem with passing on unreliable information is both bigger and older than this new field of rubbish that has grown fed by covidfears.

Some twentyfive years ago or so years I bought a CD with Creedence Clearwater Revival`s greatest hits.

Back in the bronze age, when I was young, this group were among my absolute favourites, and I guess I wanted that CD in pure nostalgia. Well, there among the other greatest hits it was, naturally. ”I heard it through the grapevine”.

There have always been a lot of things to be heard through the grapevine, particulary about those not present at the moment! And they are not all so pleasant…

I´ve been waiting for the day, when people would learn that a person should be considered innocent until proven guilty, for quite some time now, and I´m glad  I didn´t start out holding my breath!

At least we confessing Christians ought to realize that spreading rumours and gossip is too bad a game to be played by us! Even worse, it´s a sin!

It happens often, too often, that people are both judged and condemned on basis of suspicion and speculation.

They don´t even get a fair chance to defend themselves, they don´t even know what kind of evil fairytales that are told behind their backs!

I have even heard people defend their loose talking by saying ”But it must be true, because this is what I´ve been told!”

Such stupidity comes pretty close to be both unholy and ungodly, it is no ”sancta simplicitas”, that´s for sure!

I know brothers in Christ who have received harsh letters and phonecalls, and even have had their ministries seriously damaged, not because of something they have done, but because people have been all too willing and ready to spread rumours and lies about them, and those who have listened have been all too ready and willing to believe it all!

And if there is anything that dies even harder than old habits, it´s false rumours! Once the word is out it can´t be contained anymore. Therefore it shouldn´t be let out in the first place!

Anyone, who joins in in this game, should be aware of the fact that he joins in on the Devil´s team.

He is the father of all lies!

Let me put it like this: Don´t believe in everything you hear about other people! Believe only in what is proven beyond every reasonable doubt to be true!

If all Christians would start playing by that rule, the Devil probably would have a nervous breakdown!

Like I said, I´m waiting for this to happen, but I`ll still not hold my breathe while I´m waiting. There seem to be too many folks around that find some kind of perverse pleasure in slandering…

My failing memory does not, however, diminish the importance of what the author is telling us!

”A number of years ago, I had the privilege of teaching at a school of ministry. My students were hungry for God, and I was constantly searching for ways to challenge them to fall more in love with Jesus and to become voices for revival in the Church.

I came across a quote attributed most often to Rev. Sam Pascoe. It is a short version of the history of Christianity, and it goes like this: ”Christianity started in Palestine as a fellowship; it moved to Greece and became a philosophy; it moved to Italy and became an institution; it moved to Europe and became a culture; it came to America and became an enterprise”.

Some of the students were only 18 or 19 years old–barely out of diapers–and I wanted them to understand and appreciate the import of the last line, so I clarified it by adding, “An enterprise. That’s a business.”

After a few moments Martha, the youngest student in the class, raised her hand. I could not imagine what her question might be. I thought the little vignette was self-explanatory, and that I had performed it brilliantly. Nevertheless, I acknowledged Martha’s raised hand, “Yes, Martha.”

She asked such a simple question, “A business? But isn’t it supposed to be a body?” I could not envision where this line of questioning was going, and the only response I could think of was, “Yes.” She continued, “But when a body becomes a business, isn’t that a prostitute?”

The room went dead silent. For several seconds no one moved or spoke. We were stunned, afraid to make a sound because the presence of God had flooded into the room, and we knew we were on holy ground. All I could think in those sacred moments was, “Wow, I wish I’d thought of that.” I didn’t dare express that thought aloud. God had taken over the class.

Martha’s question changed my life. For six months, I thought about her question at least once every day. “When a body becomes a business, isn’t that a prostitute?” There is only one answer to her question. The answer is “Yes.” The American Church, tragically, is heavily populated by people who do not love God. How can we love Him? We don’t even know Him; and I mean really know Him.

What do I mean when I say “really know Him?” Our understanding of knowing and knowledge stems from our western culture (which is based in ancient Greek philosophical thought). We believe we have knowledge (and, by extension, wisdom) when we have collected information. A collection of information is not the same thing as knowledge, especially in the culture of the Bible (which is an eastern, non-Greek, culture). In the eastern culture, all knowledge is experiential. In western/Greek culture, we argue from premise to conclusion without regard for experience–or so we think.

An example might be helpful here. Let us suppose a question based upon the following two premises: First, that wheat does not grow in a cold climate and second, that England has a cold climate. The question: Does wheat grow in England? The vast majority of people from the western/Greek culture would answer, “No. If wheat does not grow in a cold climate and if England has a cold climate, then it follows that wheat does not grow in England.”

In the eastern culture, the answer to the same question, based on the same premises, most likely would be, “I don’t know. I’ve never been to England.”

We laugh at this thinking, but when I posed the same question to my friends from England, their answer was, “Yes, of course wheat grows in England. We’re from there, and we know wheat grows there.” They overcame their cultural way of thinking because of their life experience. Experience trumps information when it comes to knowledge.

A similar problem exists with our concept of belief. We say we believe something (or someone) apart from personal experience. This definition of belief is not extended to our stockbroker, however. Again, allow me to explain.

Suppose my stockbroker phones me and says, “I have a hot tip on a stock that is going to triple in price within the next week. I want your permission to transfer $10,000 from your cash account and buy this stock.”

That’s a lot of money for me, so I ask, “Do you really believe this stock will triple in price, and so quickly?” He/she answers, I sure do.” I say, “That sounds great! How exciting! So how much of your own money have you invested in this stock?” He/she answers, “None.”

Does my stockbroker believe? Truly believe? I don’t think so, and suddenly I don’t believe, either.

How can we be so discerning in the things of this world, especially when they involve money, and so indiscriminate when it comes to spiritual things? The fact is, we do not know or believe apart from experience. The Bible was written to people who would not understand the concepts of knowledge, belief, and faith apart from experience. I suspect God thinks this way also.

So I stand by my statement that most American Christians do not know God–much less love Him. The root of this condition originates in how we came to God.

Most of us came to Him because of what we were told He would do for us. We were promised that He would bless us in life and take us to heaven after death. We married Him for His money, and we don’t care if He lives or dies as long as we can get His stuff.

We have made the Kingdom of God into a business, merchandising His anointing. This should not be. We are commanded to love God, and are called to be the Bride of Christ–that’s pretty intimate stuff. We are supposed to be His lovers. How can we love someone we don’t even know? And even if we do know someone, is that a guarantee that we truly love them? Are we lovers or prostitutes?

I was pondering Martha’s question again one day, and considered the question, “What’s the difference between a lover and a prostitute?” I realized that both do many of the same things, but a lover does what she does because she loves. A prostitute pretends to love, but only as long as you pay. Then I asked the question, “What would happen if God stopped paying me?”

For the next several months, I allowed God to search me to uncover my motives for loving and serving Him. Was I really a true lover of God? What would happen if He stopped blessing me? What if He never did another thing for me? Would I still love Him?

Please understand, I believe in the promises and blessings of God. The issue here is not whether God blesses His children; the issue is the condition of my heart. Why do I serve Him? Are His blessings in my life the gifts of a loving Father, or are they a wage that I have earned or a bribe/payment to love Him? Do I love God without any conditions?

It took several months to work through these questions. Even now I wonder if my desire to love God is always matched by my attitude and behavior. I still catch myself being disappointed with God and angry that He has not met some perceived need in my life. I suspect this is something which is never fully resolved, but I want more than anything else to be a true lover of God.

So what is it going to be? Which are we, lover or prostitute?

There are no prostitutes in heaven, or in the Kingdom of God for that matter, but there are plenty of former prostitutes in both places.

Take it from a recovering prostitute when I say there is no substitute for unconditional, intimate relationship with God. And I mean there is no palatable substitute available to us (take another look at Matthew 7:21-23 sometime). We must choose.”

As newly retired people often do, I have been looking back at my time in active service, there is much to remember, and many memories are pretty hilarious – as I keep a selective memory, I mostly remember pleasant things, which is a grace to be grateful for!

Let me share a story that started as a joke, but then became reality!

I once heard a story of a preacherman who had visited a place, he had been there for a week for a series of revival meetings. When he was thanked with flowers and flowery speech at the end of the last meeting, he himself also offered his thanks for having been chosen as speaker.

An elderly man in the congregation rose to his feets and replied ”Don´t let it get to your head, you were only fourth on the list of preachers we had thought of for this!”

I remember I thought this was a good story when I heard it, but I was pretty sure it was a made up one. I just couldn´t get myself to believe that someone would actually say something like that!

Well, some fifteen years ago a lady called me on the phone and asked if I had a mind for coming to her congregation and do some preaching. I watched the date up in my calendar and said it was OK with me.

Then I heard a great sigh of relief in the other end of the line, and then she said: ”I had already called just every pastor and preacher I could think of, and nobody could come, and I was already thinking that we might have to postpone the whole thing! But then I thought I could give you a call, just as a last resort…”

Isn´t it wonderful to feel really needed!

I put the phone down, and then I laughed until I cried.

The joke hade become reality!

People can, it seems, blurt out almost anything without thinking!

But, you better not let things like this get to your head, not one way nor the other!

I went there, and we had good, blessed meetings, and it seemed to me that maybe those other, more gifted and wellknown preachers had said their no, thanks for a reason: to let me know that even if I am a fourth in line-guy, the Lord still can use me, if He is so inclined!

And that goes for all of us.

Before our fellow Christians we might be lined up as a queu, one standing in front, another behind, but before the Lord we stand side by side!

In His eyes we are all sinners, saved by grace and serving by grace, and all that has any real, spiritual value in our lives comes from Him, not from us…

I felt like please, no, it´s the middle of the night! Somehow I managed to get my feet on the floor and rise, but my mood didn´t. Johnny Cash sings that he stumbled down the stairs to greet the day. I stumbled down the stairs and greeted the cat, which also seemed to be insultingly fresh, just like that annoying voice upstairs.

Well, we had some breakfast, my wife left for work, and I began thinking through my  own day, what I have to do today, and in which order I should do it. Eventually I even had the sense to pray! By then my mood was already rising, and when I realized I would have the opportunity to study the Scriptures and pray together with my friends down in Overmark in the evening, I really got on the track! This is something I mostly – not always, but mostly – look forward to with great expectations! It´s like eating and drinking to me!

Being ”under the anointing”, in God´s presence, is the most wonderful thing we can experience in this life! The feeling of being carried and empowered by Someone so much greater, so totally omnipotent, and yet so loving, so caring, so close, to feel the warmth,the easyness in having the words you need just coming to you, the love for your fellow believers flowing through you, the freedom in knowing this is God´s work, not mine – I´m just thankful for being allowed to go with Him and watch what He is doing – it´s just incredible!

It hasn´t always been like this in my life, you know.

I wasn´t exactly what you call a happy, whole, free, mature human being on the evening when Jesus found me.

When I got saved, to me it meant entering something totally new and different, a life where I slowly started to find myself, find my way, little by little become what God had intended me to be, and all along that new road I found life  gradually becoming easier, fuller, more worth living!

Not as it has always been steadily going upwards, there have been ups and downs, of course, but the main trend is clear: it´s been getting better for 41 years!

When I was young I sometimes listened to Uriah Heep´s music.

One of their greatest hists was called ”Easy Living”.

Back then I never got around to really listen to the lyrics, and if I had I would probably not have understood what they were singing about, as I wasn´t yet saved then.

The song was written by one of the band members after he had met Jesus and become a Christian, and the lyrics goes like this:

”This is a thing I´ve never known before, it´s called easy living

This is a place I´ve never seen before, and I´ve been forgiven

Easy living, and I´ve been forgiven

since You´ve taken Your place in my heart

Somewhere along the lonely road I had tried to find You

Day after day on that windy road I had walked behind You

Easy living, and I´ve been forgiven

since You´ve taken Your place in my heart…

Today I can identify with it. This is what I feel right now, eight o´clock Wednesday morning.

I´ve been forgiven, Jesus lives in me, and this is life, easy living, living with a capital L!

Thank you, Jesus, and glory to God!

Or perhaps you think that when you’re dead, you just stay in your grave?

Is God just a thought within your head, or is He a part of you?

Is Christ just a name that you read in a book, when you were at school?

When you think about death, do you lose your breathe

or do you keep your cool?

Would you like to see the Pope on the end of a rope

- do you think he’s a fool?

Well I have seen the truth. Yes I have seen the light

and I’ve changed my ways

And I’ll be prepared, when you’re lonely and scared

at the end of our days

Could it be you’re afraid of what you friends might say

if they knew you believe in God above?

They should realize before they criticise

That God is the only way to love

Is your mind so small that you have to fall

in with the pack wherever they run?

Will you still sneer when death is near

And say they may as well worship the sun?

I think it was true: it was people like you that crucified Christ

I think it sad the opinion you had was the only one voiced

Will you be so sure when your day is near say you don’t believe?

You had the chance but you turned it down

now you can’t retrieve.

Perhaps you’ll think before you say, that God is dead and gone

Open your eyes, just, realize that he is the One

The only One Who can save you now from all this hate

Or will you still jeer at all you hear?

Yes – I think it’s too late.”

This is the lyrics of  ”After forever”, a song from one of Black Sabbath´s early albums. He who wrote these words wasn´t many inches from the Kingdom of God! Close enough to see the light, close enough to want to enter…

But, and I am sorry to have to say it, sometime, somehow, Ozzy Osbourne turned away.

If he be a believer in Christ today, he has sure hidden it well these past forty years ( or thirtyfive)

One can just wonder where he stands today – and where he is going.

And I wonder where you stand today?

I wonder if you happen to stand at the same crossroads where Ozzy was standing back then, when he wrote this song? Close enough to realize that you have a soul, close enough to have woken up to realize that there is something more coming ”after forever”, that all doesn´t end when your life on this earth has come to an end?

But you have not yet entered the Kingdom, have not yet received Jesus and confessed Him as your Lord and Saviour.

You can´t go on forever straddling the fence, you know. Jesus said that we can either be with Him or against Him, there is no in-between.

King Herod stands as a warning to us all – he wasn´t far from the kingdom, he would listen to John the Baptist, he was genuinely interested – he saw the light, but wasn´t willing to pay the prize for entering. And he ended up beheading the prophet and giving his head to a dancing girl… and three years later he was mocking Jesus and joining in with Pilate and the high priest.

He sat too long on the fence, and then he was finally pushed off it, and fell on the wrong side.

He had his chance, but he turned it down.

Don´t let this happen to you!

It is not too late yet, but it will be too late one day!

On the Judgement Day there will be no place to run, nowhere to hide, but for those who believe in Jesus there will be no need to run or hide!

An oldfashioned turn-or-burn-preacher couldn´t have done this better!

We seldom hear this kind of straightforward message nowadays, not even from the pulpit, but it is said that if we Christians don´t speak the message of God, then the very stones will shout it!

Here it is, their sermon, based, as it seems, on 2 Cor 4:4 and 2 Thess 2:9-12!

”You’re searching for your mind, don’t know where to start

Can’t find the key to fit the lock on your heart

You think you know, but you are never quite sure

Your soul is ill, but you will not find cure

Your world was made for you by someone above

But you choose evil ways instead of love

You made me master of the world where you exist

The soul I took from you was not even missed…”

Lord of this world

Evil Possessor

Lord of this world

He’s your confessor now!

”You think you’re innocent you’ve nothing to fear

You don’t know me, you say, but isn’t it clear?

You turn to me in all your wordly greed and pride

But will you turn to me when it’s your turn to die?”

As I said, these here lyrics are quite a sermon! What is said in them is t´s all true.

We were made by Someone above, and this beautiful world was made for us by this same Someone.

And He wants us to love Him and one another.

And if we choose evil ways of greed and pride instead of the Lord´s double commandment of love, then we also choose to serve the devil.

We make him lord of our world, lord of our lives.

We trade the love of God for the cruelty and hatred of His enemy.

Striking a deal like that is poor choice and bad business – and you wouldn´t do that, would you?

Tomorrow this darkness will probably be gone, it hits every now and then, and then it´s gone,  and I can make a very qualified guess where it is coming from, but right now it is here, and I have to deal with it, and with the sense of loneliness and lack of meaning it always brings with it. And I have to deal with it in the right way, or it will get worse!

Few songs have touched my  sense of loneliness like Simon & Garfunkels ”I´m a rock” does.

I still remember being a teenager with a few people I knew and almost no friends, feeling strange and apart, and understood by no one, and listening to Paul Simon as he like magic managed to put words to my feelings.

Judging from how popular this song was I wasn´t the only one who connected to these lyrics!

”A winters day, in a deep and dark december, I am alone,

Gazing from my window to the streets below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock, I am an island.

I´ve built walls, a fortress deep and mighty,
That none may penetrate.
I have no need of friendship; friendship causes pain.
Its laughter and its loving I disdain.
I am a rock, I am an island.

Don´t talk of love, I´ve heard the word before;
It´s sleeping in my memory.
I won´t disturb the slumber of feelings that have died.
If I never loved I never would have cried.
I am a rock, I am an island.

I have my books and my poetry to protect me;
I am shielded in my armor,
Hiding in my room, safe within my womb.
I touch no one and no one touches me.
I am a rock, I am an island.
And a rock feels no pain;
And an island never cries”

If we give in to this kind of response to disappointment and loneliness, if we choose to hide, to close the door and let no one in, to put up so many defences that in the end nobody can reach us anymore, then we have chosen a strategy of survival that will destroy us in the end.

It doesn´t protect you from bitterness or from any other kind of destructive feelings, it doesn´t protect you from the evil words or acts of other people, but it does very effectively close out all friendship, all love, all good things that might come your way!

This kind of shield and armour produces the opposite of what the lonely and hurt imagines it would bring!

Ever since Adam and Eve tried to hide themselves among the bushes in the Garden of Eden, this has been Man´s instinct. To run and hide, in order to protect themselves.

And it kills us, because we weren´t made for loneliness!

And when I myself remember how I felt back then, fortyfive years ago, I realize once again how fantastic it is that I got saved, that someone handed me my invitation to go home to my Father, come to the one place from which I shall never get thrown out.

I´ll never be alone again…

There is another thing, too, that I sincerely hope will not be found in heaven, and that is computers.

My feelings towards that hellish invention can be described in one short sentence: I hate computers! And they seem to feel the same towards me.

My sentiments were refreshed once again this week, when I decided it was time to buy a new ADSL-modem/router, the old one was showing symptoms of getting old and tired, just as it´s owner.

So, with hesitant steps I went to the store, out of mercy I shall mention no names, and explained to a polite young man what I needed.

Which was given to me, while he assured me that everything I needed for the installation was to be found in the package. I had a few suspicions at that stage, but since I was in a hurry I decided to trust him, paid, went home and readied myself for battle.

”Three simple steps to configurate, and no experience needed”. So it was said.

I wouldn´t have got past even the first step without any earlier experience from the war against the army of Silicon Valley.  It was, however, the second one that defeated me. Which means to say the installation guide.

With the help of the all-knowing Google I learned that VPI means virtual path identifier, and that VCI means virtual channel identifier, but it gave me no clue as to which digits I was supposed to enter in the empty fields.

So I tried to call the store where I bought the lump of electronic idiocy I was fighting.

”If you want this, press one, if you want that, press two, if you want the third or the fourth, press five and six”.

And I obediently pressed the buttons I was required to press, but did it get me anywhere? A bit closer to a nervous breakdown, perhaps, but nothing else.

After a few more attempts I changed tactics, and went searching for the manufacturer´s homepage.

Where I found the device I had bought, yes, and where the tree simple steps, that required no previous knowledge or experience with computers,  changed into sixtyfour pages of unintelligible technical specifications and advices.

As much I learned, however, that the VPI and VCI specifications were to be found at my internet provider, and that they also would supply me with the information whether they automatically gave me an IP-adress or not, which I needed to know, since the configuration wizard demanded me to choose between four alternatives, depending on what kind of internet I had. There were dynamics and bridges and who knows what.

But, since I still had some hope, I tried to call the phone company´s helpdesk. With exactly the same amount of success as I had had with the store. Is there anybody out there who has ever got through to a real, living, human being, when calling a supportnumber??

So. I tried their homepage. Where I learned that they gave technical support only for devices that they had sold themselves. Which meant to say I could not get the digits I was supposed to feed to the digital demon in front of me.

I began to realize that I, once again, was a defeated man. There ain´t no cure to the computer blues.

Then I called the store again, only this time I chose the button that put me through to the department of selling new products, not to the helpdesk. And, of course, and just as I expected, I got through immediately. I explained my case, and was at once, with no problems and no delays whatsoever, put through to the helpdesk.

Sometimes one little event speaks more than a thousand words.

I told the lady in the other end that I had only one question:  Could I get my money back?  She told me I had the right to return the device within thirty days if I didn`t like it, which was the first good news of that day.

An hour later I got a mail from the store, where some bright young fellow offered to guide me through the installation on the phone, because, as he put it, ”It is really very simple”.

He could as well have come right out, and told me in plain words that he considered me to be a hopeless moron.

I thanked him for his concern, but since I have had some experience with computer expert´s abilities to share their knowledge with the outer world, I chose not to take up his offer. I felt I had already taken all that I could take from this particular store and it´s items.

I do hope, from the depts of my heart and soul, that there will be nothing that even remotely reminds of a computer in heaven, or anything that is in any way kin to them.

And yes, I returned the modem to the store, and got me another from the phone company, one that was configurated and ready for my use. Which, of course, was what I should have done in the first place.

And, as the ultimate scorn from my victorious enemy, this new modem, which flawlessly started to feed the wonders of internet into my monitor as soon as it was connected, was twenty euros cheaper than the one that had ruined a whole day and almost one nights sleep!

Thank you, thank you, thank you, Lord, that there will be no computers needed in heaven!