Opinion

Discovering tainted bread

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

When I went home for lunch the other day my nose thrilled to the scent of green chili simmering on the stove. That's my kind of "nose candy." I made my way directly to the stove, grabbed the spoon and stirred the concoction of pork, bell peppers (homegrown), diced green chilies, tomatoes (homegrown), onions and jalapenos, leaning in close to capture the full aroma, filling my senses, awakening my appetite for a beef and bean burrito smothered in Danny's green chili.

This menu is my downfall, I'll readily admit. I can barely move if I am actually able to clean my plate. Ofttimes, my eyes are much bigger than my stomach and I have to leave a bit behind. Now that the children are grown and gone, we freeze a good portion of the chili back for use on other days. Otherwise, I would have a burrito for lunch and dinner both, for days on end, until the chili was gone. My clothing budget simply cannot take that kind of strain.

It is a fact that our reactions to certain scents are so profound that real estate agents readily recommend that home sellers bake a loaf of bread or simmer a potpourri of apple pie spices before showing a house. Our agent actually baked cookies during an open house he conducted in our former home in Brighton. Apparently, it's the aroma that sells. It worked for us.

I use my sense of smell to check the freshness of many items. A suspicious pound of hamburger gets a quick whiff, just in case its gone over. So, too, a loaf of bread that has been in the cupboard too long. I cannot stand the smell, nor the taste, of stale bread and can always detect spoilage through my olfactory glands long before my eyes can see the fuzzy green evidence. Yuck.

My sensitive nose knows.

So, too, does my sensitive spirit.

My nose knows through the best teacher of all -- experience combined with knowledge. I have had bread fresh out of the oven and I have had bread that has fallen behind the cereal and was forgotten overlong or discovered too late.

My spirit knows through the same curriculum. That's why I am such a careful student of Scripture. It is all too easy, and in these latter days, all too likely that someone, intentionally or not, has perverted the Word of God, tainting the very bread of life.

But if I'd never searched it out for myself, I could easily be taken in by some "new teaching," because it contains just enough truth to make it palatable.

We live in an astonishing age. We have more resources at hand than at any other time in human history, for both the secular and the spiritual. This can be both a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing if we utilize the resources at hand to seek out truth, to carefully test the spirits, because it is written, "Dear friends, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world." (I John 4:1).

It is a curse if we allow the resources to distract, pervert or otherwise obscure the very truth we claim to seek.

With the cost of groceries constantly on the rise, we do well to carefully to check expiration dates.

And with all of the food additives and nutrition issues around us, we also do well to carefully to check the list of ingredients on the products we purchase and consume. We should be no less diligent in carefully discerning the messages of faith that abound.

In fact, perhaps even more diligence is required in issues of faith.

After all, there is much more on the line spiritually if we eat spiritual fast food than is on the line when we pick up dinner at the local drive-thru window.

"For we are to God the aroma of Christ among those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To the one we are the smell of death; to the other, the fragrance of life. And who is equal to such a task?" 2 Corinthians 2:15, 16 (NIV)

Things you won't see in heaven: Day-old bread

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