I love making bread. On Sunday at the beginning of worship, with the help of my Kenwood Chef, the children and I mixed 20 g of salt, 560 mls of filtered water and 1 kg of ‘OO’ flour. Then we added the starter from 6am (1 teaspoon dried yeast, I tsp of sugar, 1 scoop of flour, water enough to make it quite wet). It was bubbling nicely, and the children did not like the smell. I will not repeat one quite colorful comparison. Then we took the dough out of the mixing bowl, and worked it together on the tabletop, oiled it, put it back in the bowl under a tea towel, to let it rise. At the end of church the children got to take home their own bit of pizza dough. Here is one yummy result that night.
- Jesus used the work of a woman to describe God. For all the ordinary women listening to him their lives are suddenly transformed. Their weekly task of making bread suddenly becomes God work, holy work.
- Crazy abundance. This woman is working 30 kgs of flour. She is strong. She is powerful. She is patient. It will take time to rise. It will take a lot of work to turn that much dough into so many flat breads, and then bake them. She will have enough to feed her whole village. There are times for us to enjoy abundance, to celebrate and to deliberately choose to have fun.
- God’s work is slow and steady, in us and around us. That’s the normal pattern. God keeps working love, mercy, forgiveness, grace and hope into our lives.
- There is a blessing on the slow, careful work we do, within our families, in our paid work, in our friendships, in our activities. Not everything has to be fast and flashy to be worthwhile. Sometimes our best work is hidden and unseen.
