When Something Doesn’t Seem to Belong

It was May 2005.  I had just graduated college and it was about three weeks until my wedding. My fiancé was in Canada with his family and I was in Oklahoma with mine. My days were filled with putting the finishing touches on the big day, writing countless thank-you notes (Oy, the thank-you notes!) and enjoying spending time with my family during my last weeks as a single woman.

One day, everyone at my house had somewhere to be besides me.  So my mom had asked me to make the spaghetti sauce for our supper that night.  She handed me the recipe and everyone left. Now remember, I was a young soon-to-be married bride with not a ton of cooking experience under my belt.  I knew how to cook a few things, and I could easily follow a recipe - right? 

Well...

I got the recipe and began to make the sauce.  I put in the olive oil and began to sauté the onions and garlic.  I grabbed the can of crushed tomatoes and the tomato paste.  And then I saw it.  An ingredient that, to me, did not belong in a tomato sauce.  What was odd ingredient, you ask? Chicken broth. 

Now, it may seem silly to you because - of course you can put chicken broth in a tomato sauce.  It adds tons of great flavour!  But to me, a young inexperienced cook, it made absolutely no sense! I thought my mom had copied it down wrong.  I didn't understand.

I stood there staring at the recipe for a while, confused as to what to do.  I could just leave it out. But what if she meant to write something different, and if I didn't put it in, the sauce would taste horrible?  What should I do?  My family was going to come home expecting a great meal of homemade spaghetti and I was going to ruin it.

I think the combination of being tired from a long semester at college, emotions of soon being married, and the pressure of my family expecting supper that night sent me into a bout of crying. It was at just this moment my fiancé' called the house.  He sensed right away that something was up and asked what was wrong.  I explained to him that I was confused about a recipe and tried to explain why.  He didn't seem to get what I was saying, so he wasn’t able to clear things up for me.

After some more fretting and crying, I decided to just go with it and put in the chicken broth.  It didn’t make sense to me, but that’s what was on the recipe.  I added the rest of the ingredients and finished the sauce.  And guess what?  

It. Was. Good.  Like, really delicious good.  Like, the chicken broth made all the difference good.

So, why am I talking about and making us all hungry for spaghetti sauce?  For this simple lesson: 

Just because we don't understand something in our life doesn't mean it is bad or doesn't belong.  

Even though chicken broth seemed wildly out of place, it added so much depth of flavour to the sauce.

The same can be true of things that come into our life that don't seem to belong.  That sickness, unemployment, family member who is difficult to deal with, financial struggle, loss of loved one, or unexplained trial all may seem like there is no purpose for their placement in your life’s “recipe.”  

We can't see how it will all work together in the grand scheme of things.  But when all the seemingly good and bad of our life get mixed together, it can make a wonderful and flavourful whole that is undeniably good and exactly how it is supposed to be.

James 1:2-4 tells us:

“My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations;

Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.

But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing.”

Notice that this is a command.  It doesn't say, "If you want to, you can count it joy..."  No, it is an imperative statement.  We are to count it joy when we come into trials.  And why? Because this testing is to bring about a steadfastness in our faith.  Although we may not know the specific reason these hard trials come onto our paths, we do know that the bigger reason is that God is using it to strengthen our faith - to make us stronger, to make us better.

I once was talking with a friend about different trials each of us were facing.  We commented on how sometimes we look at other believers, perhaps those more mature in their faith, and wish we had their strength.  It is easy to look with admiration at the faith they have now, wishing we could be just like that. 

But what we don't see is all that they went through to get there.  We don't see that it took trials and hardships to grow and strengthen the faith they have today.  We don't see the many sleepless nights they spent wondering what God was doing, why these things were happening to them. But if it weren't for those things, they would not have the strong faith they exemplify today. (Just read Hebrews 11 to see a large list of men and women who went through some terrible trials - had things in their life that didn’t seem to belong- yet they are specifically named and are considered our “Heroes of the Faith”).

So maybe, instead of being confused and start crying and panicking because we don't understand why the recipe for our life calls for "chicken broth," we can count it joy and look at it as an ingredient to add a depth of flavour to our faith that we would never have known otherwise.

And just so you know, now, whenever I am making spaghetti sauce, I always add chicken broth. 😉