During my recent medical leave, I did not bake or cook for the first three weeks. Besides not being able to reach and lift, I also had plenty of delicious food supplied for me by the gracious people of PMBC.
When I found myself getting antsy to return to some normalcy, the first thing I baked were sourdough popovers. Holy yumness! Hot sourdough popovers with butter and my mom’s huckleberry jelly was surely what my doctors had ordered!
If you aren’t familiar with how sourdough works, let me share. I keep a jar of sourdough starter in my fridge that gets “fed” with flour and water every 1-2 weeks. Once it gets fed, it starts bubbling away and some gets used for baking. Some goes back into the fridge for my next baking session.
At feeding time some of the sourdough starter gets labeled as “discard,” and true to its name – what doesn’t get used for baking that day gets thrown away. If I kept all of the starter at feeding time, I’d quickly end up with far more starter than I could use or house.
I started thinking this week about the ongoing gift of sourdough starter. If I didn’t discard any of it, I could feed my whole neighborhood with starterdough goodies – indefinitely!
In 1 Corinthians 9, the Apostle Paul is calling upon the church to give generously for a special offering being taken up for the church in Jerusalem. He reminds them that God’s grace is given in such abundance that they can give abundantly to others: “God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work” (1 Cor 9:8).
This week whenever you eat bread, take a moment to give thanks for God’s abundant grace in your life and to ask God to guide your heart towards increased generosity. Just like my sourdough starter – God’s grace is always abundant.
Blessings,
Pastor Amy
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PS – Here is the recipe I used for sourdough poppovers.
PPS – And here is a recipe for regular popovers.
PPS – And here is a recipe for gluten-free popovers!
