Baked to Perfection

Steps to baking a cake. 

Find recipe

Gather ingredients 

Mix ingredients

Bake

Frost

Eat

My Bible study this morning compared going through our life to baking a cake. What if we got too tired after gathering ingredients and decided to just eat the ingredients separately? The sugar would still be sweet, perhaps even too sweet. But the flour would be dry and almost unbearable to choke down. Then the eggs would gag us with their thick, raw gooeyness. Our lives have parts that are not easy to swallow but when we walk through the guck we get baked into the person we are meant to be. The beautiful frosted cake blends all the ingredients into the sweet treat that we all enjoy. Our life is enhanced by the walk through the stuff that seems to hard to swallow. 

I know if I had a rubber spatula aka child cheater and could have eliminated some of the hardships in my life, I would toss them in the trash. But even the worst parts have brought me to where I am and how I live my life. I would never choose to lose my precious Ryan to suicide. Because of that loss I have others in my life that God has connected me to through our grief. Having loved ones in my life struggling with life destroying addictions has been excruciating. Because of these struggles I am able to understand others who share the crippling fear, heartbreak and the holding of our breaths for the possibility of a horrific phone call. Because of my separation during my marriage I appreciate the life Ron and I have rebuilt together and how God has healed our relationship. Now I know the amazing love story we share is deeper because of the years apart. 

These ingredients that are a part of my life have at times been unbearable but in the end have baked into the life I now have that tastes so sweet. 

James 1:2-4 The Passion Translation (TPT)

2 My fellow believers, when it seems as though you are facing nothing but difficulties see it as an invaluable opportunity to experience the greatest joy that you can! 3 For you know that when your faith is tested[a] it stirs up power within you to endure all things. 4 And then as your endurance grows even stronger it will release perfection into every part of your being until there is nothing missing and nothing lacking.

In Him,

Joyful

3-1-19