A Nice Pot of Pintos

 

T

he Christmas holidays will be here before you know it.  We spend so much time and effort in preparing for them and in no time, it seems they have come and gone leaving us feeling empty, tired, washed out, and just a little down.  During the weeks leading up to Christmas, we spend all kinds of energy decorating the house, preparing for the arrival of friends and family, trying to find the perfect gift, and cooking all kinds of holiday treats and dishes. 

 

Of course, this last activity means that we also spend a lot of time eating and, if you’re like me, you spend way too much time at this particular activity!  So, after the holidays, we eat our way through all the leftovers, finding new and inventive ways to prepare turkey, ham, chicken, and a host of left-over casseroles and congealed salads.  All this delectable food only leaves us with a desire for good, basic food, every-day staples we love but never really think about until we deprive ourselves of them for a while. 

 

The telltale sign that the holiday feasting is over is heralded by my mother’s statement that it’s time for a nice pot of pintos.  She loves them as a dish to a meal or as a meal in and of themselves.  The rest of us share her enthusiasm.  On a cold day, there simply is nothing better than a large pot filled with pinto beans.  There is nothing fancy about them, but they meet the need we have for “real food”, food that satisfies and fills rather than food that tantalizes and leaves us hungry for more. 

 

Spiritual hunger is also a very real part of human nature and a need we all have.  The world offers us many delectable dishes that satisfy for a while but in the end leave us empty and hungry for more.  They do not completely satisfy; they only temporarily satiate our taste buds, providing no lasting relief from the hunger in our souls.  Although they are enticing, they do not meet our need and they leave us searching for something else to feast upon. 

 

This was exactly the issue Jesus addressed in John 6:35, “Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.”   Here, Jesus addresses the needs of all those who would find true satisfaction for the hunger in their souls.  To survive and to live all we need is bread and water. They are the necessities of life.  These two elements are common to every culture and are used by all people in order to sustain life.  Who can imagine sitting down to a meal with no bread and what satisfies our thirst better than a cool glass of water? 

 

The people surrounding Jesus that day were questioning him about the manna that came down from Heaven when the Hebrew children wondered in the desert for 40 years on their way to the Promised Land.  Jesus reminded them that those who ate of this bread grew hungry again and eventually died.  But Jesus brought good news to those listening that day because he promised that those who partook of him, those who accepted him as God’s bread from heaven, the giver of life and the savior of mankind, would never go hungry and would never die.  The people’s understanding was, however, too shallow.  Jesus did not mean they would never have physical hunger again, but he did mean that the gnawing hunger in the soul for meaning, purpose, and relationship would be totally satisfied once and for all. 

 

This promise is as true today as the day Jesus spoke these words.  People everywhere are searching for “something.”  Self-help shelves in bookstores are filled with all kinds of people making all kinds of promises provided we subscribe to their particular ideology.  We have people telling us how to raise kids though they themselves have none.  People who have never been married or who have been married numerous times write about having a successful marriage.  Yet none of these satisfies us; they only leave us with a desire to read more books.   

 

We don’t need more books, what we need is a relationship!  None of the authors of these self-help books is interested in a relationship with us; they want to sell books.  There is a book, however, that has the answer we are searching for, and that book is the Bible.  Within its pages is the bread to feed our hunger and the water to slake our thirst.  In lieu of all the delectable things life offers us, what we really need is good, basic, wholesome, and satisfying food.  A nice pot of pintos beats filet mignon any day of the week!  What are you hungry for today?