Not By Bread Alone

I borrowed 20 bread-making cookbooks from the Bishan Library in the last one over week. One cookbook says, "Place the dough in a container, except metal, to rise." Why not metal container, I wondered? I found the answer in another cookbook - metal container may impart metallic taste to the dough and conduct heat which hasten the dough to rise too quickly. Oh, ok, I'll use ceramic container then .....

My sis can't understand why I have to read so many of the cookbooks. While I've already learned from a baking demonstration class to bake a fairly decent white bread , the bookish me find the cookbooks very interesting in providing detailed explanations not only of the what and how, but also the why and when of bread-making.

And so as I enjoy the heavenly aroma and taste of freshly baked home-made bread, I savour the ingestion of information nuggets in the cookbooks. Food for the stomach and food for the brain.

What about food for the soul? Scripture says, "Man does not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God." (Deueronomy 8:3, Matthew 4:4) The psalmist says, "But his delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither. Whatever he does prospers." (Psalam 1:2-3)

I think at some point in time, food for the soul becomes more important than food for the body (or brain). As we grow older and our material needs have been satisfied, life may feel empty and needing something beyond the material. Recently, when I asked my bro-in-law about his religious life, he said his belief in God is "a matter of timing". He agreed with me that belief in God is a 精神寄托 (which I roughly translate as spiritual commitment).

The Life Application Bible says:
Many people think that life is based on satisfying their appetites. If they can earn enough money to dress, eat, and play in high style, they think they are living 'the good life'. But such things do not satisfy our deepest longings. In the end they leave us empty and dissatisfied. Real life, according to Moses, comes from total commitment to God, the one who created life itself. It requires discipline, sacrifice, and hard work, and that's why most people never find it.

It has taken me a long while to find the real bread of life and the true living waters - Jesus Christ. "Taste and see that the Lord is good; blessed is the man who takes refuge in him." (Psalm 34:8) I've tasted His goodness. Have you?