Mother was going to make a birthday cake for Nicole. This was not her real birthday; it was her half birthday, because she was only six months old.
“It will be a very little cake,” said Mother, “because she is only half-a-year old!”
“May we help make it?” both Mark and Julie asked.
“I could certainly use some help,” said Mother. She pulled two chairs over to the counter. “And you know,” she went on, “there’s something God can teach us while we make this cake.”
Mark and Julie climbed up on the chairs and took turns stirring the butter and sugar Mother had just put into the bowl.
Mother said, “The two things we’ve put in so far we like very much, don’t we?”
Mark and Julie agreed, because they sure did like butter and sugar.
“But now we have to put in some things that don’t taste very good - baking powder and flour.”
The two children tasted a little of both the baking powder and the flour and quickly agreed that they didn’t like the taste of either one, but especially the baking powder.
Then Mother went on with her explanation. “But when we mix together the things we like and the things we don’t like, what do we get? We get a cake that tastes good!” Mother added little spoonfuls of other things, and Mark and Julie kept stirring.
Then Mother explained, “God works the same way. He lets some things come to us that we like very much, butter-and-sugar kinds of things. But He also lets some things come to us that we don’t like, baking powder-and-flour kinds of things. These may be unhappy things like being sick or being hurt by something someone says about us. But God knows that all these things are needed to make us turn out the way He wants. We couldn’t use our cake very well if it had only sugar and butter in it. And God couldn’t use us very well either if only things we like happened to us.”
Nicole’s little half-a-birthday cake (with only half a candle on it) was dessert for supper that night. After supper Daddy taught them a Bible verse that said just what Mother had been telling them while they made the cake: “All things work together for good to them that love God” (Romans 8:2828And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose. (Romans 8:28)).
ML-05/07/1995