When Life is Like a Box of Chocolates
Somehow, James Wood won't let me get chocolate off my mind. He's a writer for the New Yorker magazine, but his words in this week's issue didn't bring to life the taste of the sweet stuff. Instead, with the unenviable task of reviewing the novel All for One that deals with daily life on the home front in Nazi Germany, Wood pauses the action for chocolate or its distressing absence.
Two Ukrainian maids are complaining to each other about the collapse of society around them. Wood notes that they seem more concerned for the chocolate they haven't had in a long time than the disappearance of their mistress. "Monstrous," Wood rightly harrumphs with our initial reaction. But wait, he insists. For these two, money and time for chocolate has in the past been a sign that were crucial issues were already in order. It was a sweet flourish of well-being, so its absence is noteworthy.
How often do we just tune in long enough to hear the people around us lament the absence of the chocolate without, like Wood, probing for its actual significance? We have reason not to engage a second look or listen. Without doing so, we can congratulate ourselves for what we readily label our own mature detachment. WE wouldn't get upset about chocolate when there is a war on. As Christians in a fallen world, there is a war on so we can add a layer of spiritual justification to our armored indifference.
What is our chocolate? In the best sense, what are the little, unnecessary details of which God makes us aware as a sign more important matters are also handled? Psalm 104:15 expresses God's goodness in terms of wine to gladden the heart and oil for the face, extras like chocolate transfigured into genuine, biblical worship. While we have them, raising our own Psalm 104:15 can be especially gratifying. Psalm 151, the Psalm of Brian, would include the sunrises and wee ones on swing sets that used to calm my heart on the way to work and the New York Times Audio Digest and The Briefing podcast by Albert Mohler which still provide some structure for my mornings while I await a return to work. The glory of God as revealed in a high definition baseball telecast would get its own Psalm.
When we can't get some of the little luxuries that translate the divine vastness into our individual love language, we can understand the dialogues and diatribes around us a little better. We can listen for the heart's cry behind the complaint about a work issue, over a politician's actions, or even over chocolate. Instead of detaching ourselves, we can use the fodder of daily conversation as fuel for closer relationships. Crucially, we can turn the seemingly insignificant things our neighbors complain about two prompts to intercede for them in prayer.
Two Ukrainian maids are complaining to each other about the collapse of society around them. Wood notes that they seem more concerned for the chocolate they haven't had in a long time than the disappearance of their mistress. "Monstrous," Wood rightly harrumphs with our initial reaction. But wait, he insists. For these two, money and time for chocolate has in the past been a sign that were crucial issues were already in order. It was a sweet flourish of well-being, so its absence is noteworthy.
How often do we just tune in long enough to hear the people around us lament the absence of the chocolate without, like Wood, probing for its actual significance? We have reason not to engage a second look or listen. Without doing so, we can congratulate ourselves for what we readily label our own mature detachment. WE wouldn't get upset about chocolate when there is a war on. As Christians in a fallen world, there is a war on so we can add a layer of spiritual justification to our armored indifference.
What is our chocolate? In the best sense, what are the little, unnecessary details of which God makes us aware as a sign more important matters are also handled? Psalm 104:15 expresses God's goodness in terms of wine to gladden the heart and oil for the face, extras like chocolate transfigured into genuine, biblical worship. While we have them, raising our own Psalm 104:15 can be especially gratifying. Psalm 151, the Psalm of Brian, would include the sunrises and wee ones on swing sets that used to calm my heart on the way to work and the New York Times Audio Digest and The Briefing podcast by Albert Mohler which still provide some structure for my mornings while I await a return to work. The glory of God as revealed in a high definition baseball telecast would get its own Psalm.
When we can't get some of the little luxuries that translate the divine vastness into our individual love language, we can understand the dialogues and diatribes around us a little better. We can listen for the heart's cry behind the complaint about a work issue, over a politician's actions, or even over chocolate. Instead of detaching ourselves, we can use the fodder of daily conversation as fuel for closer relationships. Crucially, we can turn the seemingly insignificant things our neighbors complain about two prompts to intercede for them in prayer.
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