Something-Somehow

It’s just a sign scrawled unpolished and unprofessional on cardboard, and hung askew like a ”Come On In” sign in the friendly window of a weathered and well used country general store. It’s this kind of sign, the kind imperfect, that tells of the good business that Christ is doing inside, in me, because “Come On In” is swinging on the smudged glass door of my life. The steps leading up to the door are worn to the shape of His sandals. Sign swings with door swing and I know it’s Him. He’s coming on in to ask me today if I have a five pound bag of wheat flour, knowing that I don’t.

“And some honey?” He asks with an amused look in His eye.

“Yeast and oil?” Is that sheer delight I detect in His expression?  

He doesn’t need it. I do and He knows I do and He’s getting it for me. It’s His business in me, and He’s making preparations so that I have everything I need to do it. It’s a good work He’s planned. A something-somehow work is what it will look like when I get in elbow deep.

I dissolve honey in a bowl of very warm water and add yeast. I watch it sit and feed on the honey, bubble, foam, expand alive and warm in the bowl and I bend over waving my hand to stir the yeasty fragrance up to my nose. Inhale the scent of what’s living right there in bowl, already rising, to take the grain into its life for purpose prepared. The good work has begun and I dip my finger into the honey. Taste it.

Jesus is sweet nourish and I expand alive tasting.

Flour and salt are measured. I’m in a hurry today and sadly deny myself the pleasure of hand-kneading the dough until it’s elastic and smooth and my hands carry the yeasty warm fragrance I love so much. I flip the switch with a tad too much vigor and whirling dough hook sends flour dust everywhere. I’m covered. The counter is covered. The dog at my feet jumps up and chases flour dust settling through sun stream. Whatever good and perfect work Jesus has planned for me to do will most always look like a something- somehow never-mind-me kind of work. I promise!

And I don’t mind. I’ve decided it’s best not to because the alternative…minding the dust while it settles…is an exercise in frustration. So I don’t mind as I make slow progress and it comes to me that this is what it’s all about. It’s the something-somehow process of a good work that Jesus comes in to do.

He’s worn a path to my front door. And when we walk it together, me throwing flour all over kingdom, let’s just say the path isn’t paved and assured knowing exactly where it’s going and what it’s all about. It’s more like a winding dirt road suited to slow travel and worn shoes that don’t mind kicking up dust and my feet in those shoes not minding.

Not minding looking like I really don’t know what I’m doing, but doing something good anyway. Not minding that I clearly don’t know exactly how to go about it, but going about it somehow. Something-somehow.

Brushing flour dust off my face, what thing I know for certain is that the old road to Emmaus was fit for dusty feet in worn shoes and two travelers who really didn’t know what the walk was all about, but One travelling companion who did and He knows what this is all about too. It was about their walk with Him. And it’s still about that.

 

The loaves are in oven and my kitchen smells divine. I fill bowl with hot soapy water and drop dough hook in. Suds spray up and apart and it’s time to listen


“What’s this all about, Lord? The honey, oil, flour and yeast. The flour dust. And why did You want to talk about Emmaus?”

It’s time to listen.

“It’s about three-day old bread resurrected and served fresh. It’s about Living Bread rising in you while I open My word and ignite your heart until it burns within you. It’s about opening the door of your oven-like heart and My essence wafting from there. About presenting the loaf to others and serving Me to them. Fresh.”

Hmmm. I have pulled the loaves out. I slice the bread thick and hold it steaming fragrant to my nose. How can I resist? I don’t want to. And that’s what it’s about.

“He took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them” (Luke 24:30). I hold it in my open hands. He serves the bread, His body. I don’t want to resist. I want this Bread.

And I serve this bread to my family at table because it’s about being served His body and serving His body. About knowing Him in the breaking of bread. About faith and serving. About faith Jesus had in His Father and saving work on the cross because of it. About “I will show you my faith by my works” (Ja. 2:18).

It’s about communing with Him and serving as He served. Sacrificially. Himself. Myself. Presenting myself a living sacrifice. Sweet, bubbling alive, fragrant offering.

And it’s always still about my walk with Jesus. In the kitchen not minding flour dust all over hands and apron front, and serving God’s risen love to others. About something good, somehow done.

He walks with me and I don’t always know it, exactly. But when I listen like the two travelers on the old Emmaus road, I eventually know Him in the bread.

There may be a lot of dusty flour stirred up, but at table with family I may  say as the Emmaus travelers said, “The Lord is risen, indeed!” and tell them the things that He has done. The things that happened on the road. In my kitchen. At table. In communion with Him. My testimony. His testimony. And how I knew Him in the bread.

 

written by: Carolyn Roehrig