Good morning beloved. God continues to give us grace for a new day. We do not know what the day holds but we do know that it holds something. May your day be filled with New and exciting measures of God.
A few years ago one of the biggest movies of the year was “Forest Gump.” Actor Tom Hanks played the role of a handicapped man whose mother believed in him to the extent that he was willing to try anything. He would often quote one of his mother’s favorite lines. “Momma says life is like a box of chocolates. You never know what you are going to get.”
I used to enjoy getting a box of chocolates. I loved the fact that there is an assortment of chocolates that I had to try and enjoy. My favorites were the peanut clusters, toffee, and the caramel ones. But I never enjoyed coming across one that had a filling that didn’t suit my taste buds. Nor, did I enjoy the dark chocolate ones. The problem was, of course, that I could not tell what was what just by looking at them; and that was before the days when candy manufacturers started putting a diagram on the underside of the box top to help in the process of identification.
This is such as life. Life is like a box of chocolates, loaded with surprises, some delightful and some downright disagreeable. The only way that I could tell what was inside a piece of chocolate was by tasting it. The delicious ones, of course, are easy to swallow, but the unpleasant ones are sometimes hard to stomach. I usually ended up spitting these out. But unfortunately, the taste would still be in my mouth. Life can give you circumstances that don’t feel good. They can leave a bad taste in your mouth, or you wish that you could just throw away and try another one but it doesn’t always work that way. The fact that it is distasteful is never known until it is tried. But, when we experience the displeasing issues in life, those yucky ones, however, determine our depth of character. If life were all good, and your faith was never challenged, where would you be spiritually? It’s the bad times that test our faith and cause us to mature as we learn to rely on God through everything we endure.
We may acknowledge in the abstract that life is like a box of chocolates, but when we get what we do not want, we have to somehow convince ourselves that it has nothing to do with who we are as individuals since we are supposed to be in charge of making our own identity. But the truth of the matter is that most of life is indeed a response to that which comes upon us. But God is the one that is really in charge. We do not get to choose where we are born, nor do we get to decide which parents we want. We do not get to pick our genetic makeup, neither do we choose what socio-economic class we grow up in. And it certainly does not need to be said that we do not decide which country and under what government and in what situation we enter the world. We cannot control how others act toward us. We do not get to choose our gifts and graces. I could go on, but I think I have sufficiently made my point.
I believe that to fully understand this quote we have to think about what is really meant by the word life. According to the World Book Encyclopedia, life is “a state, existence, or principle of existence conceived as belonging to the soul.” Most people, when questioned about life would not have a very clear or concise answer because life is not something that is altogether concrete. In general, life is considered to be everything that happens to a person from the moment they are born to the moment they die. All of their interactions with the world and all of their thoughts and actions. There does not seem to be any plan or order to these events, just everything that happens. Everything. Life is a long process with good, bad and indifferent points.
What life and this box of chocolates represents to me, is that there is uncertainty and a lack of order. It’s hard to know if a day is going to be a good day or a bad day, you just know that it will be a day. The same holds true for eating a box of chocolates. When you open a box of chocolates, there are rows of different chocolates. When you pick one up, there is no way of knowing if you will get a good chocolate or a bad chocolate, you just know you’ll get a chocolate. So you know that it will not be easy to tell if it was good or bad until the chocolate, or the day, has been completed. You never know what will happen. Life is very unpredictable!!!!!
“For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him.” Colossians 1:16
Live life, give people hope, share your heart, wisdom, and resources. Never place a period where God says there should be a comma.
As always, peace and blessings, be safe. Remember God loves you and so do I. © krw 2.11.16
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