Pea soup...

I hate pea soup...always have. It looks, how shall I say it, like baby poop and the smell of it? Well, let's just say, I've had my issues with pea soup. I know I sound childish but I'd rather eat practically anything other than pea soup.

Earlier this year, I was at a weekend retreat where all the women involved were to make a meal...you won't believe it, at lunch one day, it was pea soup. I had seen her making it, I had desperately hoped two choices would be available, but no. The lunch menu was pea soup. This was a small gathering of ladies, no flying under the radar here, so I did the only polite thing I could think of; I took as little of it as I could to still look like I was eating and grateful. The childhood memories of pea soup and the hope of pea soup escape over-took me as I sat down for lunch... no way of escape. We prayed, I prayed harder that I would not shame myself at the table. Taking my spoon and with a "MMMMM" smile took a bite.

What happened next totally floored me...I liked it. This pea soup tasted nothing like the pea soup I have had in the past. This was good, it wasn't only good...it tasted great. I actually enjoyed it. I went back for more. I asked for the recipe. I went home and bought split peas for the first time in my life. In my book, pea soup has been redeemed. Wow. Never, ever thought I would think that! Pea Soup.

So, what does this have to do with anything? It made me stop and consider, how many things in my life, in my circumstances, or even a few people, I can tend to look at and even treat like pea soup. Yuck. There are things in my life that make my stomach twist and turn, I dread...things and issues that I hate, just like pea soup. Things that I have conditioned with a response, just like my pea soup response.

But, what if the Lord is able to make things that we have issues about, preconceived opinions about...even unpleasant experiences we have had and change the "taste"? What if He could make them "taste" different? What if these people or circumstances could be transformed into something other than what they are...what if I am transformed? What if my "taste" for these things changed...and it was great? Or am I just so conditoned with my response of "Yuck" I don't even give them a try? Do I just asumme it's the same old, same old. Ummmmm....

Isaiah 43:18-19

"Do not call to mind the former things, or ponder things of the past. Behold, I will do something new, Now it will spring forth; Will you not be aware of it? I will even make a roadway in the wilderness and rivers in the desert."

Our God is in the business of making and re-making. He makes things new....even a pea soup life. How am I viewing my pea soup?