We're like cocoa beans

I wasn't ever really interested in the process of a cocoa bean into chocolate until God showed me a cocoa bean and nothing else. So, I looked it up and realized how familiar the process is. Not because I've made chocolate before, but because our lives can easily be compared to it. Quick summary: starts as a seed, grows into a tree, trees are trimmed for the harvest, they're left out for days to get rid of their bitter taste until the process of fermentation starts to take place, then they're ready to be sent to the factory. The beans are sorted and cleaned, then placed in big drums for the roasting process. The beans let off a sweet pleasing aroma as they roast. After roasting, the shell is removed. The inside is crushed and made into a pure and undefiled paste, the base of what all chocolate will become. Then, other ingredients are added to make it into different types of chocolate. After the ingredients are added, it goes through yet another refining process. The longer the heating process takes, the higher the quality of the chocolate will be, and then it's ready to be placed into molds to form the bars.
God showed me a lot through this, and I really feel like He's calling us to come back to what may seem as a simple revelation, but it's vital that we grasp and apply it daily.

We have something inside of us that is capable of becoming and doing things beyond what we can even imagine, but it will only happen if we allow ourselves to go through the refining fire and be seperated and set apart. We know that the Bible says that they will know we are Christians by our love, but if we only lavish it out on our children and families, we are showing no more love than the pegans do. I feel like we get into these comfort zones, that are traps. We really do have to discern between rest and laziness. If our lives are always problem free, are we really standing up for God? Are we really allowing ourselves to become seperated? There is too much compromise in our lives. There is a strong call to the church to really be in the world and not of it. We have to let God get us to the place where we can truely be changed. We have to lay our lives down so God can move. We have to lay down control, manipulation, past hurts and pride.

So many of us return to this place, and very well should! But we have to decide what kind of flavor to be, what ingredients should go into us. We need God through His word and presence...the things that we allow to take His place will only harm us. We'll become tainted, unbalanced, and unhealthy. God wants to move. He desires to do things in this area and bring His Kingdom like never before. He wants our desires to line up with His, and our mentality to be one of the Kingdom's. When our lives are laid down, He is exalted, and it rises as worship to the thrown room, permeating the winds in heaven.

Audrey Perry