Cottage Cheese and WHAT?
So, when The Parent Trap (1998) gave us the idea that Oreos and peanut butter together was a strange snack that people found disgusting, many of us thought of our favorite bad food combination and decided not to tell anybody else about our snacking. It has been my experience, however, that almost everyone has some strange combination of foods that they like to put together. These strange things brought together to create something even more incredible, if only to our own individual and unique tastes. And personal tastes seem to matter a great deal in the modern world.
You’ve heard the phrase before- the customer is always right. Except, that’s only half the truth. The customer is always right in matters of taste. You want pineapple on your pizza (yes, please!) it’s no problem, but you do not get to tell the workers at the pizzeria how to make a pizza. Want your walls painted burnt orange to go with your crushed velvet settee? You can spend your money on that if you want, but don’t tell the painters how to dip their brushes in the paint can. Somewhere along the way we got the idea that we would always be right.
This past year has left a lot of faithful people asking the question of if they have done the right thing. These last few years to be more accurate. And recently God put something on my heart that I hope will resonate just as much with you as it has with me. Thet we will not be the church for everybody, but we can be the church for anybody.
Not everybody likes hymns, but we can still lift our voices and sing together. Not everybody likes pastors who sit still behind the pulpit while others cannot abide a pastor who paces and moves. The tastes we bring to worship are okay- it is important that we are spiritually fed where we worship. But there are other things, mostly theological, where there is a clear line on what is and is not acceptable. Hatred of other people is a sin. Turning away those who would seek Jesus at the communion table is a sin in the United Methodist tradition (though not universally). Seeking violence, or threatening violence against those who find themselves experiencing homelessness or in acts of desperation seeking alms on the side of the road is a sin. Speaking in favor of war is a sin. Turning away from suffering of innocents, like those who are caught up in the violence in the Ukraine or Gaza, is supposed to be a sin.
And yet, even in all of this despair and the realities of increased polarization and politicization of theology, there is still hope. God has worked greater miracles. The first followers of Christ were not some monolith of people who all thought, felt, lived, or acted in one accord without Christ’s strong intervention. Some were fishers first, others tax collectors. They argued about who was the greatest and who would have the best seat in heaven. They had big fights, especially after Christ’s death, about whether or not to include the gentiles. People have always been different from each other and always disagreed, but with God’s help, we’re able to set aside any pride or ego to love and serve God fully. To remember that it’s not about our opinion, but God’s. And since God loves everybody it seems to matter less what feeds someone so much as they are being fed by the Spirit.
For all you who are thinking about asking, the simple answer is that I like cottage cheese with spicy chips. Things like the chili lime protein chips from Quest or Sun Chips garden salsa variety. The spice is cooled by the dairy and the crunch of the chips is a nice addition to the smoothness of the cottage cheese. And for those who are wondering who God will gather together in God’s name? Someday it’s supposed to be all the nations, all of us, together at last. And maybe somewhere in the teeming masses of 8 plus billion people I’ll find someone who likes the same snack as me and we’ll be able to worship God together. What a glorious day that will be.
The wolf shall live with the lamb; the leopard shall lie down with the kid; the calf and the lion will feed together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze; their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea. -Isaiah 11:6-9 (NRSVUE)
