Inspirational Article From Joanne Lowe Index of Writings by Joanne Lowe on Gospel Web

GOD’S KITCHEN

“Ye are the salt of the earth: but if the salt have lost his savour, wherewith shall it be salted? it is thenceforth good for nothing, but to be cast out, and to be trodden under foot of men.”

Matthew 5:13 King James Version

I saw this statement on the cover of a magazine “A Balanced Life Begins in the Kitchen”. I thought how true this statement is but it does not begin in our kitchens; it begins in God’s kitchen. I made a big salad last night and I put some of it in a bowl to eat for dinner. I picked up the bowl to go sit down and eat it and I’m not sure what happened but the bowl and all of its contents ended up on the floor upside down.

It was as if someone had knocked it out of my hand. All of the ingredients; the lettuce, tomatoes, onions, croutons and bacon bits were all over my kitchen floor. I had made a vinegar and water dressing with sugar so all of that was also on my floor. Needless to say, my floor was very sticky and I had to immediately mop it with hot sudsy water it so it didn’t attract roaches and ants.

If a balanced life really begins in our kitchens, I would have been extremely upset and I probably would have lost my temper and thrown something when the salad and the vinegar and water fell on my floor. However, a balanced life begins in God’s kitchen. He is the one who softens our hearts to make us into the kind of Christians that He wants us to become. Instead of getting angry and letting it upset me, I started laughing because I realized that it was simply an attack from satan to keep me from writing about God’s kitchen.

Jesus has already prepared my heart for difficult situations and crises so I was able to laugh it off. He has been working on my heart for years to make me tenderhearted, compassionate, forgiving and usable for His service. However, I am far from being the person He wants me to be but He knows my heart and He knows that I love Him and want to please Him. I fail Him and when I do, it breaks my heart. I want my life to be pleasing to Him. When He looks into my heart, I want Him to see a person who is caring and loving.

I used to have a terrible temper. He has already forgiven me of all of my sins and has taken away all of the resentment, anger, hatred, sarcasm and criticism that I had buried deep in my heart for many years. This seasoning salt only comes through the cleansing atoning blood of Jesus. We must be prepared and seasoned with compassion for others and with a willingness to forgive people when someone hurts us.

Have you been to God’s kitchen? Have you allowed Him to season your heart with compassion, kindness, tenderness, and unconditional love? If He hasn’t seasoned your heart, then anything that you do is meaningless and in vain. Everything that we say or do must come from a heart that has been properly seasoned through the power of our risen Saviour. He is the only one who can take a hardened heart and melt it into a heart filled with compassion and unconditional love for others. What condition is your heart in today?

Joanne Lowe

August 30, 2007

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