Sunday Smackdown: Christians vs the Waitstaff
It’s Sunday morning at the local chain restaurant. A crew of bleary-eyed young adults shuffle in the door, donning aprons to prepare the restaurant for the day’s events. It is Sunday; D-day for restaurant employees. Sunday is the most feared day of the week for restaurant employees that directly contact the public, such as the servers. (Yes, we call them servers now - try calling your male server a “waitress” and see (or taste) where that gets you).
Sunday is not the feared day because we Christians storm the place with the joy of the Lord through the Holy Sprit, keeping the restaurants busy. Sunday’s are truly busy mornings in comparison to the others for restaurants, but certainly no busier than a Saturday night. It is the worst day for restaurant employees because of our horrible behavior as Christians…. the children of God.
Around Noon, the first of us Christians blow in the door. Hungry, stressed from dealing with the kids, and uncomfortable from wearing that suit to church that we didn’t want to wear anyway, we proceed to dump our problems in the laps of the restaurant employees. We are rude, overly-demanding, and worst of all… cheap.
Is it all Christians that do this? Certainly not, but it is enough that all Christians have been painted with this brush. We blame “the enemy for using this to try and steal our witness”, or “the enemy is using that to try and steal our witness”. This time though, the enemy is using us.
The cards are stacked against the restaurant employees from the start by Christians. Most Christians still do not tithe regularly, but even so many that do, do so begrudingly. After giving away money to God that they didn’t want to, how likely are they to give a good tip to their server? One Christian restaurant employee I know told me, “They don’t even give the good Lord 10%, what makes us think that we’re going to get 15% (for a tip)”
We need to positively recognize people that are serving us. How did the Apostles treat Jesus when he washed their feet? Wonderful - he is Jesus! How do you think they treated servants who washed their feet after a long journey? After meeting Jesus, I bet they treated these servants well, but before? Maybe not so well.
We even have ministers on TV such as Kenneth Copeland reaffirming that servers are lazy, and “You just can’t get good service anymore.” I know he said this on several occasions because I have listened to nearly every show of theirs for the last 3 years. I know that the Copelands spend a great deal of time in restaurants and have a wide base of experience to draw from while making this statement about servers, but it is not accurate. He never prefaces his indictment of the service industry by saying “Hey, I just got done speaking for 5 hours today, like I have for the past 3 days. I am tired and a bit cranky from it all, and hey - I’ve been doing the Lord’s work. My associates and I should get special treatment.”
Now, I know he doesn’t say those things out loud, but we ALL think things like that sometimes whether we admit it or not. Think about it - we come out of church with a message that convicted us. However, now that we are back on the right track, we somehow expect everyone that wasn’t in that church service to hear the sermon, and to live by those lessons. Crazy, I know. I’ve done it before, though.
We need to be a shining example to the world when we visit to a restaurant. Our joy in the Lord must radiate from us so people say, “What is it about those Christians? Why are they so happy even when the world is going to crap?” Want to know who holds that title currently? The Mormons.
We need to give God’s message to the world. Not a talented orator? That’s okay, because our lives can be the greatest sermon we ever gave - far more effective than the spoken word. Treat the server like they are Jesus washing your feet. “Even if they are doing a bad job?” Yes; especially if they are doing a bad job. Poor work means one of two things in their life.
- The server is having a rough day or worse, a rough life. In this case they need some of Jesus’ love ministered through us.
- The server is lazy, and/or hates their job. In this case they especially need Jesus’ love. They won’t give respect when they don’t have any themselves.
Learn tip etiquette. Learn tip etiquette.
Yes, I meant to do that. The tip is our final contact with these servers (people). Saying “God bless you” or giving them a Bible tract, in lieu of tip completely negates God’s message. May God forgive every one of us who do this.
In America, good service deserves 15 percent regardless of how much we tithed, or how much we just spent on the meal. The server doesn’t care. More importantly, neither does God.
I say go further - tip over 15 percent. Business tip etiquette suggests that we tip at least 20%. This is because we are representing our business. Since we are representing the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords’ business I suggest that the 20% figure is a nice start.
At least once a year, I challenge everyone to give an “extreme tip”. Bless the money first, and ask God to multiply it in the person’s life - bringing them to a closer relationship with him. Make the tip unreasonably good, and most importantly leave before they see it - this removes any chance we are doing it to benefit our ego.
Be nice in restaurants - It isn’t our server’s fault we may go to a church where we feel compelled to wear a suit. The server should also not be punished because we can’t control our kids, didn’t get enough sleep, or would rather be golfing.
Are you a nice person? Jon Maxwell, a great Christian leadership author said that you can tell a great deal about a person by how they act in a restaurant. He said if you are eating with a nice person who treats the server poorly, then that person is not actually a nice person. Do you consider yourself to be a nice person?
Clean up after ourselves - Yes, I know they get paid to do that, but when we let our kids pour the sugars all over the table (or the parents do it), we grind the baby’s crackers into the carpet, and leave food from one end of the table to the other, we are revealing that we are complete slobs, and extremely self-centered. That surely isn’t the Christian way.
Do not look down on your server because they are working on “the Lord’s day”. They wouldn’t be there if we weren’t. I know it sounds crazy that some people would think that, but unfortunately there are. (Shout-out to the Pharisees) : the Lord’s day is whatever day you make it - it used to be Saturday, anyway.
In closing, we should treat our servers like we want them to come to church with us next Sunday. Visit a restaurant enough, and you may actually get that opportunity. At least you may interest them is seeing what “that Jesus thing” is all about and they may check out that church they always drove by but haven’t visited.
Get ‘em in the door people, God will take care of the rest.
While there is much truth in what you have to say, I can’t agree with all of it.
Waitstaff are paid to provide a service. It doesn’t make sense to reward bad service. While we don’t have to be punitive in our tip, we can be instructional. If we have been good customers and have received bad service, a minimum tip makes a statement. If the service was extremely poor a cordial inquiry with the waitstaff may be appropriate. I have personally asked a waitress, with genuine concern, if they are having a bad day. If they answer my inquiry rudely, then a minimum tip is in order. If I discern that they are just having a bad day, then I over tip.
I would even go so far as to say that if a waiter has been really bad, the owner or supervisor would appreciate it being called to his attention.
I wouldn’t pay 10% above the sale price for an automobile to be a witness to a salesman. I wouldn’t go into the gas station and give the attendant an extra $5 for my gas to be a witness. I won’t give 20 percent to a bad serving waiter. It only reinforces in my mind that their behavior is acceptable, or that they think they are entitled to it just for being there.
I have given over the top tips to deserving and underserving waiters, but only after discerning as best I can the intent of my tip.
The article does not support over-tipping for poor service. It promotes showing Christ’s love to those who may be providing poor service. The level of tip given to them was indirectly addressed in the bold font in the latter paragraph where it said “good service deserves a 15% tip.”
The article is also not written to “good customers”, although I am sure as many people think they are “good customers” as they are “good people”. We know from the Bible that none of us are good.
I would also recommend that we avoid using the phrase “instructional”. This sounds mighty self-righteous, and assumes that the person doing the instructing knows what they are talking about. This also assumes the recipient of the instruction will receive it. Proverbs 9:7-9 suggests that we not rebuke the mockers (or bad servers) unless we are sure they are a wise man or woman.
Strangely enough on the major issues it looks like we agree - from different sides of the “preachy” coin.