In the Fire? God’s Perfect Bakery
God Sees What You Can’t!
Thinking of someone who’s an incredible baker… moving expertly in the kitchen with experience and ease - gained by thousands of days of practice.
Each time she was about to begin her next creation, she placed all the ingredients out on the counter.
The lineup of ingredients, on their own, was unappealing. Buttermilk? No thanks. . . it’s sour and tastes strange. Self-rising flour? Too dry and inedible. Baking soda? Not palatable unless forced down as medicine for an upset stomach. Salt? Too salty to ever be enjoyed by itself. Certain vegetable oils? Not something I would enjoy swallowing.
If I were to walk in and have no idea what was happening, all of these ingredients would turn me away! None of them were appealing enough to tempt me to enjoy. Yet, when mixed and shaped by expert hands and placed in an impossibly hot oven, they turned into the best biscuits I’ve ever tasted! How she did it was almost wizardry!
If we look at the individual pieces of our lives, we might see a sour mix of ingredients. Disappointment here, grief there, anger and hardship sprinkled throughout. Thankfully, we have the “expert baker” to the highest degree on our side! Where we might see nothing but bitter, undesirable moments, God knows just how to create something impossibly good.
Baking doesn’t just require one type of ingredient or another. It is a mix of sweet, bitter, and salty, blended throughout to create a bite so perfect you forget the final product was ever a mix of pieces to begin with.
Honestly, there isn’t any plan God could present where I would eagerly agree to heartbreak and pain. But over the decades of my life, I have come to realize that trying to pick and choose the things that I would have liked to be part of my story would result in missing out on the ultimate surprising, surpassing goodness of His plan for my life.
As beautiful as some of our stories in Scripture are, we must be familiar with the entire story of those who loved God and were called according to His purpose.
Abraham was asked to lay down his precious Isaac. Moses contended with threats from Pharoah. David endured decades running from Saul in the wilderness.
Our lives here are never promised to be perfect. But God will make them perfect.
Let the Lord take those bitter parts and make something beautiful out of them. Do not ever give up! You may feel like you’re in the fire right now, and maybe you are—maybe this is your time in the impossibly hot oven as He forms you into the beautiful creation He designed you to be.
In every high and low in life, I pray you see it all with gratitude. The expert baker knows exactly what He’s doing, and is making something new from each and every ingredient.
Prayers & Scriptures: 🙏🙏
Lord, help me to keep sight of Your goodness in the brokenness of this world. I realize I must keep my eyes fixed on You and the Truth of Your Word. Thank You for the peace You give me. I want my security to be found in You — my unchanging, undeniably good and unquestionably loving God. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
John 11:25-26 - Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. The one who believes in me will live, even though they die; and whoever lives by believing in me will never die. Do you believe this?”
Colossians 3:13 - Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you.
Romans 8:38-39 - For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.
Isaiah 43:2 - When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze.
2 Corinthians 4:18 - So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen, since what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.
Listen Friend,
Our story, our desperate needs, are never all about us. God answers our prayers when He’ll get the most glory and can reach the most significant number of people with our story. God is on a global rescue mission. He delights in every detail of your life. But He also knows who needs to hear your story and see your life before and after your breakthrough.
