Gratitude and Awe

I once read a story about a young Chinese boy who was lost and starving, eating leaves and dirt to stay alive. He came to a house where he was given a bowl of rice and gratefully filled his empty stomach. Ever since, I find a simple bowl of rice evokes a deep sense of gratitude for the most basic of foods. This whole week has been a rhythmic repetition of that theme—gratitude and awe over God’s creation, for simple and nutritious food from the earth.

On Monday morning I woke up extra early to cook rice and beans for breakfast. We’d offered the kids to have regular breakfasts and save the beans and rice for dinners, but Hannah announced she wanted to try our new diet for every meal. Dave, Hannah and I sat down to steaming plates of rice with savory kidney beans and a dollop of plain yogurt on top. The artificially colored marshmallows in the boys’ cold cereal bowls looked poor and processed in comparison.
I love not having to think about what to make for dinner. The beans go on to soak at noon. Sometime in the afternoon, I start them simmering. As the kids are doing homework, the spices are added. Then the rice goes on the stove. A few chopped veggies and some yogurt on the side, and we have a delicious meal.

We’ve even been trying new recipes from around the world, from our favorite cookbook, Extending the Table: a World Community Cookbook published by Faith and Life Press. Monday was Red beans and rice from Mexico, Tuesday Cuban-style black beans and rice from Puerto Rico, Wednesday spiced lentils and rice from Bangladesh, Thursday white beans and vegetables from Iran, and today we’ll have curried chickpeas from India. We find the country on the globe and pray for that country.

As Robert (a new attender of NPC) reminded me on Sunday, beans and rice isn’t a subsistence diet at all to much of the world. It’s the equivalent of a thanksgiving meal! Imagine that with our simple feasts all week, we are saving about $40-$50 in grocery money to pass on to World Vision. Isn’t that just like God, to hide a treasure of abundance in a veil of simplicity?

2 Corinthians 9:8, 10-11, 14-15 describes God’s generosity at work:
8And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that in all things at all times, having all that you need, you will abound in every good work….10Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. 11You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God…. 14And in their prayers for you their hearts will go out to you, because of the surpassing grace God has given you. 15Thanks be to God for his indescribable gift!

Submitted by: Kristen Mark