Marian is a human macaroni. I met her at the Mission Food Bank
where she and I work together every other Thursday. She has a sweet,
gentle temperament, is full of love and exudes a winsome eagerness
to serve the needy people who come to the mission.
"You've been poor in the past, haven't you, Marian?" I asked her last
Thursday as I watched her gentle interaction with people while she
helped them register.
She looked at me thoughtfully. "No," she answered, "I have not been financially hurting, but I know what it is to suffer."
Marian's Story
Over the course of the morning, her story unfolded. Marian had been pressed through trials (a childhood battle with a congenital defect, the untimely and unexpected death of her husband, and her battle with cancer after his death), and yet she had not rebelled at the hand of God on her life. She had remained pliable under the pressure and had emerged shaped into the generous woman I now knew. As she talked, I thought, "She has been extruded through the noodlemaker of life."
Noodlemaker
Have you ever seen a noodlemaker? My husband, Larry, once bought me one for $5 that he had found in a mark down bin. I loved that machine! It could shape any sort of noodle imaginable. The most impressive to me was the macaroni attachment, which was a brass plate with a small cutout in the center. As dough was fed into the hopper, the electric screw forced it against the brass plate, pressed the dough through the cutout and created the macaroni. Excess dough from the macaroni center and sides fell back into the hopper through a process called 'extrusion.'
Definition of extrude: 'to shape by forcing through a die'
Secret to Christian Maturity
The secret to perfect macaroni is pliable dough pressed through a noodlemaker. The secret to Christian maturity is learning to rest in Jesus. It is choosing to remain pliable under the hand of God during the trials of life. And we all have trials to endure, disciplines that are designed like brass plates through which God presses us to mature us in order to bring many sons to glory. We emerge from the pressure with more of the character of God and less of the lusts of the flesh present in our lives. And it shows. Just like Marian, people see the fruit of the Spirit in our lives and are drawn to Jesus. Marian is a mature macaroni. Sweet. Tender. Useful to feed Jesus' flock. What is true of
her can be true of us, too. The trials of life can produce the life of Jesus in us if we let them.
Like Jesus, we will suffer in life, but that is not necessarily a bad thing. If we remain soft to the work of God in our lives, we will be molded into the image of Jesus. Macaroni in the hand of God. What more could
we want?
For more devotional thoughts from this contributing writer, you may want to read:
and you can visit Amy Trosen's blog at: amytrosen.blogspot.com
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Article from:
Crosspurpose International
Please include this link within body of article if copying to another website or reprinting.
For it was fitting for [Jesus], for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain [or author] of their salvation perfect [complete] through sufferings..
Hebrews 2:10
Marian the Macaroni
by Amy Trosen
Christian rticles from Crosspurpose International
...distressed through manifold temptations that the genuineness of your faith...be tested.
1 Peter 1:6-7
