Corn Cobs and Mud Pies

Luke 15:15-16 NKJV "Then he went and joined himself to a citizen of that country, and he sent him into his fields to feed swine. "And he would gladly have filled his stomach with the pods that the swine ate, and no one gave him anything.

There are a number of things that I have had to rethink over the past few years. Issues that I thought I had all figured out but have come to realize that I was totally wrong.

One of these issues is how I go about feeding my spirit. All the things I need to do in order to make sure that my spirit is strong and healthy. You see I became rather lazy. I had grown used to not thinking for myself and allowing others to, in a sense, spoon feed me. I never really questioned what they were feeding me. I just went along with it because I assumed that they would only feed me good things. That whatever they set on the table before me had to be what was best for the growth of my spirit.

This is a very dangerous place to find yourself as a grown human being.

When you get deeply involved in a relationship where you are totally dependent upon someone else for your well being, whether it's mental, physical, or emotional, then the relationship has the potential to stunt your growth in dramatic ways. If we look at the physical development of people from baby to adult, we see a natural progression to how people are fed.

As babies, we are all in a state of helplessness. We have no ability to feed ourselves, let alone find the food that would nourish us properly. Once we are old enough to get food from a table into our mouths we need guidance from parents about what types of food we are eating. Too many sweet things and we can permanently damage our bodies in various ways. We need to be taught about what is healthy and nourishing and what is meant to be eaten in moderation. 

The goal is to eventually get to the place where we have both the ability to feed ourselves and the knowledge of how to properly nourish our bodies. Our spiritual lives should be no different!

Certainly when we are new in our faith we spiritually need help to feed our spirits. A lot of help. But it shouldn't stay that way. We should eventually mature enough to feed our own spirits and take care of ourselves. Paul wrote to the church in Corinth about this very issue.

1 Corinthians 3:2 NKJV I fed you with milk and not with solid food; for until now you were not able to receive it, and even now you are still not able;

He wasn't writing to them about how he had physically fed them but about how he was spiritually feeding them. They were only able to take in spiritual milk because they hadn't matured enough in faith to get spiritual meat. He was actively working to get them to grow up in the spirit!

Some of you may be wondering by now what all of this has to do with the scripture about the prodigal son I put at the beginning of this blog. Well, let me tell you. At that moment in the story, the prodigal son has latched on to a farmer in the hopes that the farmer would give him work and some food to eat. The farmer gives him work and a place to sleep (with the pigs), but nothing to eat. So here we have a young man, desperately hungry, lying with pigs in a pig pen and he has a moment where he thinks to himself maybe, just maybe, I'll eat this corn cob because I have nothing else.

Something interesting about this whole scenario. A corn cob has zero nutritional value. There is nothing about a corn cob that will provide a single bit of nourishment to your body. What it will do, is make your stomach feel full and quiet the hunger pains you are feeling.

The young man was essentially in a spot where he is holding this corn cob thinking, I know this will not actually give my body anything that it is needing but at least it will stop my stomach from growing. At least it will stop the hunger pain I'm feeling right now.

This is similar to the situation I had found myself in. I had latched on to some people in the hope that they would give me purpose and some food for my spirit to eat. And for a while I thought the relationship was working because the hunger pains I felt in my spirit would go away for a while. They would come back but then I'd always get that full feeling again.

But something wasn't right.

Even though my hunger pains were being dealt with regularly, I didn't feel spiritually stronger. In fact, I felt like I was growing weaker. Whatever was being fed to my spirit didn't seem to be nourishing it at all.

Now, I'm not saying I was getting spiritual corn cobs. No, I was getting something similar but slightly different. See, I knew I wasn't getting leftover trash. I saw the effort and work that was going in to the meals that were being set before me. It was too much work for someone to be just dumping out a garbage bag in front of me.

No, the best comparison I can make is that I was being fed what has amounted to spiritual mud pies.

Like little kids pretending to cook in the yard, gathering up their ingredients (dirt and water), then painstakingly taking the time to mix them together and form them into the perfect shapes, until finally declaring them done. Then carrying them to the table and carefully setting them in front of others so that they can show off how hard they worked and get some oohs and aaahs over how good the "food" looks. 

It was a lot of effort and show just to present me with something that would fill my belly but leave me undernourished and starving.

It reminds of a scene from the movie "Hook". There is a moment when older Peter Pan (played by Robin Williams), is sitting down to eat with all the Lost Boys in Neverland. Everyone starts to go wild at the table grabbing food and drinks but all Peter sees is empty bowls and cups. He starts to laugh and asks them if they are all playing a joke on him because he doesn't see any food. Finally one of the boys works with him and he starts to smell food and then eventually see it. The secret was that Peter needed to pretend and imagine like a child that food was there before it would actually be there.

Maybe that's the problem. I just didn't pretend hard enough. Or, as others might say, I just didn't have enough faith.

Either way, I can honestly look back and say that for quite sometime the cups and bowls were empty.

Or, at best, I was eating mud pies with a smile. After all, something kept making the hunger pains go away.

I don't blame anyone but myself for the situation. Instead of waiting to continue to be fed by someone else I should have been feeding myself. I have been a Christian long enough now and there's no excuse for me to continue on as a spiritual baby/toddler. It's been a while and I'm still getting some of the grit out of my teeth from the mud pies but I'm doing it. I'm feeding my own spirit. My strength is returning and I'm growing into a new level of spiritual maturity.

Philipians 2:12-13 NKJV Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for it is God who works in you both to will and to do for His good pleasure.

Maybe there are some of you out there going through some of the same things as me. Every situation is different but maybe you need to work on feeding yourself. Maybe you need to take a good hard look at what your being fed and see if it is nourishing at all. It has been my experience that you can sit at a table for too long. If you do, God has many ways of getting you to stand up and get moving if you have. Sometimes, what was once a feast can be turned to dust just to get you to feel dissatisfied enough to stand up and start moving on to the next destination God has in store for you.

Don't settle for corn cobs and mud pies when God has so much more for you!

God is a good father and He has many tables prepared for His children. Some are in valleys and some are on mountaintops. Some are with friends and others in the presence of enemies. They are all meant to sustain us through whatever season we find ourselves in and He never fails to give you what will nourish your spirit.

Just don't sit at them once that season is over. The Father's feast will be found at the next table He has prepared for you.