Death In the Pot

As you may know I love to paint Bible verse signs. There's one sign my husband has always wanted me to paint for our kitchen that I haven't gotten around to. The sign would be hard to paint because it needs to contain the entire story of 2 Kings 4: 38-41. You gotta read it in KJV to really appreciate it, but unfortunately this verse is occasionally a big part of our mealtime around here, usually in the winter when I like to experiment with my favorite food; soup!

Just to summarize from the KJV: Some men make a "pottage." They go to eat it and they cry out, "O Thou man of God, there is death in the pot!" And they could not eat it. Elisha prays and puts some flour into it, and there is no harm in the pot.

My family leans heavily on this passage of scripture during mealtime prayers because as far as I know this is the only time in the Bible that FOOD was actually healed. Now, as my husband explains it to the kids - this means when we pray for our food we are not just blessing it, not just thanking God for it - we are asking God to heal it. Yes, he is a funny man.

Now, I am not particularly known for my great cooking, especially when I stray off on my own without a recipe. My whole family loves to tease me about this Bible story when I set some strange concoction down on the table for supper. The conversation goes something like this:

kid: "Wow." (without enthusiasm)"What's that?"

dad: "OOh, it's Pottage!"

kids: (in unison) "Oh, thou man of God, there is death in the pot!"

And Daddy prays for the healing of the food, but I'm pretty sure God doesn't honor prayers prayed out of sarcasm. I'm no theologian or anything.