As an avid baker, I believe that just about every baked good tastes better with chocolate. I hold fast to the conviction that the reason that a cookie exists is to hold chocolate. Why you would put dead fruit in an oatmeal cookie is beyond me. Sugar cookies are just incomplete, poor things.
Different types of chocolate
Depending on the “chocolate intensity” I want for me and my family to experience, I will use either mini chips or full size chips in my treats. Mini chips are good for when you want a little chocolate flavor in every bite. Since they’re so small, they spread throughout your goodie maintaining an unassuming presence. Regular size chips are not subtle. They announce the arrival of chocolate into your mouth with an “I’m here!” Their presence is unmistakable. You can even get jumbo size chips, now those are fantastic.
Now white chocolate, in my opinion, isn’t really chocolate at all. I mean, it’s sweet to be sure, but sure doesn’t seem like it should be in the chocolate category.
Then there’s dark chocolate, my love language. It can be an acquired taste as it can be a little bitter and less sweet than other chocolates.
I’ve decided that blessings are like chocolate. They come in different types, but are all good.
How are blessings like chocolate?
Like chocolate chips, they come in “minis” and in “full size”. Mini blessings are not mini because they are somehow less important. They’re mini because they are spread throughout your day. They are the good things that happen to you that you might not consider a blessing because they happen in the mundane. Like when you’re making cookies and you need one egg and you have exactly one left in the carton, saving you a trip to the store. Or your child or grandchild draws you a picture that says “I love you, or I luv yoo” on the bottom. The more misspelled the better of course.
Like full size chips, full size blessings are the events that are unmistakably God at work: cancer in remission; the innocent set free from prison; the end of potty training after eight kids (that could be elevated to the miracle category). They are the blessings we can’t wait to share with others as evidence of God’s goodness.
White chocolate blessings are the events that might be attributed to “chance” or “good luck” and so may not be thought of as blessings. They’re the “it just so happened…” kinds of situations. For instance, we just went to Disneyland the week after stormy weather. I heard comments such as, “You guys got lucky with good weather.”
How bittersweet blessings are like chocolate
Now dark chocolate blessings are those that are bitter sweet. They might seem mostly bitter and the sweetness is realized later.
Joni Earekson Tada, who has endured 55 years of quadriplegia—not to mention two bouts of cancer, severe breathing issues, COVID-19, and chronic pain, describes a dark chocolate blessing like this:
…I always say that in a way, I hope I can take my wheelchair to heaven with me—I know that‘s not biblically correct, but if I were able, I would have my wheelchair up in heaven right next to me when God gives me my brand new, glorified body. And I will then turn to Jesus and say, “Lord, do you see that wheelchair right there? Well, you were right when you said that in this world we would have trouble, because that wheelchair was a lot of trouble! But Jesus the weaker I was in that thing, the harder I leaned on you. And the harder I leaned on you, the stronger I discovered you to be.It never would have happened had you not given me the bruising of the blessing of that wheelchair. So thank you for what you did in my life through that wheelchair. And now,” I always say jokingly, “you can send that wheelchair to hell, if you want.”
Every kind of blessing is attributable to the goodness of God and His grace, giving us what we don’t deserve. Let that be our challenge, to stop and thank Him for all of the types of blessings He gives.
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” James 1:17
I’m going to thank Him right now for the ability to taste and enjoy chocolate. What do you suppose “pre-fall” chocolate tasted like?
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