Life REALLY Is Like …Chocolate!

Facts about chocolate:

• It grows on trees and starts out as a rigid pod shaped like a football
• In is raw state, it is called “Theobroma cacao”
• Theobroma is Greek for “food of the Gods”
• Cacao is a fruit; the seeds inside is what becomes chocolate
• The seeds are both bitter and sweet
• To begin the transformation process, the seeds are fermented and then dried
• The next process is to turn the fermented, dried seeds into chocolate

 

 

                                                                                                               

 

The famous saying in the Forrest Gump movie is “…Life is like a box of chocolates. You, never know what you’re gonna get.” The seeds (beans) of the cacao fruit, which eventually becomes chocolate is both bitter and sweet. There is a transformation that has to take place before the “food of the Gods” becomes actual chocolate. That chocolate can vary from dark to milk, depending on the type of transformation.

It is not the box of chocolate that echoes life, but the transformation of the fruit to make it into what it eventually becomes. We start off as raw, ready to be shaped and molded; however, that transformation takes some fire – we just have to go through some “stuff” in order to become what the Lord would have us to be. 1 Peter 1:7  “That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ:”  Psalms 66:10 “For thou, O God, hast proved us: thou hast tried us, as silver is tried.” Psalms 66:10-12 “For thou, O God, hast proved us: thou hast tried us, as silver is tried.”

It is that trying in the fires of life that gives us strength; hardens us against the deceptions of the devil. It is what proves our faith in Him who makes all things work for good. Romans 8:28 – “And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to [his] purpose.”

Life is bitter and sweet just like the cacao beans. But just like the varying degrees of chocolate, it is conformed to meet the standards of the process. So must we, as Christians, conform to meet the standards of the Lord, not the world. Romans 12:2 “Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect”. It is what inside the pod that determines what the end results of the fruit will be. It is the same with us, what is inside of us determines how we will react to life’s circumstances. God sees us for what we really are, not what we claim to the world that we are. 1 Samuel 16:7 “But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.” Jeremiah 17:10 “I the Lord search the heart, I try the reins, even to give every man according to his ways, and according to the fruit of his doings.” Matthew 5:8 “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.”

Through obedience and surrender to the living Word of God, we can be like Theobroma cacao-the food of the Gods. John 15:14 “Ye are my friends, if ye do whatsoever I command you.” 2 John 1:6 “And this is love, that we walk after his commandments. This is the commandment, That, as ye have heard from the beginning, ye should walk in it.”