Pots, Spoons and No Fail Sauce

I'm one of those cooks who feels, if you have to cook, then get it over with as soon as possible. Forget all the cooking shows that say, "Put it on medium heat and..." I crank the fire up as high as it will go. However, there are various results of such action.

Once I was making some "No Fail Hot Fudge Sauce" from a recipe my friends, Rod and Derinda, had given me. I questioned the no fail thing but they assured me I could NOT fail with this. They didn't add my forgetfulness into the equation.

I had guests over and decided to wow them with sundaes made with homemade hot fudge sauce. I put the sauce on the stove, cranked the heat to high, stirred it with a wooden spoon, which I left in the pot, then proceeded outside to entertain my guests. Quite some time later I remembered the sauce. I rushed inside. Too late.

On my stove sat a pot with a black, brick like concoction inside. I tried to lift the spoon out. As I did, the entire pot rose with the spoon. My guests had hot fudge sundaes without the hot fudge.

Over the next few days, I tried everything to get that spoon out and clean the pot. But, as we say about marriage, "the two had become one." I had no choice but to throw them both in the trash. My only consolation was I had one less pot and spoon to wash!

Did that teach me a lesson? Yes. Did I apply it to my life? No. Years have passed since that incident and I am still burning pots (but not so as I have to throw them away...drats!). I've even convinced my husband that the brown, crunchy pieces he finds in his rice really are supposed to be there.

What lesson is to be learned from this little story? Maybe that, if we don't learn from our mistakes, we are apt to repeat them. I choose to repeat mine in the cooking arena because I am unwilling to change.

Are you like me? Do you have areas in your life that you stubbornly refuse to change, even though you know you should? If it's only refusing to lower the heat on the stove, the consequences will only result in burned pots. Failing to learn and change in other areas of life can have greater consequences.

Is God's Holy Spirit nudging you about some area in which you need to change? Give him freedom to change you. The results will be a more Christ-like you and that's always a good thing!

By the way, I have a great recipe for "Almost No Fail Hot Fudge Sauce," if you need one. Gloria