Daily Devotional for February 17, 2022
Key Ingredient
“Mom, can I bake a cake for Mrs. Grahame?” asked Gianna.
Mom looked at her in surprise. Gianna often complained about their elderly neighbor. “That’s a nice idea,” Mom said. “But why do you want to do that?”
“At church yesterday we had a lesson on kindness. We’re all supposed to do something nice for somebody this week,” Gianna explained.
“Okay. What kind of cake do you want to make?” Mom asked.
“I’ll just make my favorite chocolate brownie cake. It’s easy, and I’ve made it so many times I know the recipe by heart.”
Gianna went to the kitchen, opened the pantry door, and started pulling out ingredients. She measured and stirred, and soon the cake batter was ready. While she rummaged in the cupboard for the right size tin, her dad walked in. He tiptoed over to the cake mixture, picked up a spoon, and tasted the batter. “Yuck!” he exclaimed. “What went wrong? I think you forgot something.”
Startled, Gianna jumped and whirled around. Then she laughed. “Dad! Quit teasing!”
Dad shook his head. “There’s definitely something wrong. It tastes like there’s no sugar in there. Did you try it?”
Gianna grabbed a clean spoon and tasted the batter. She made a face. “You’re right. I don’t know how I could have missed that.” She got out the sugar and measured it. “Mrs. Grahame probably wouldn’t have noticed anyway. She’s so sour!” Gianna said with a frown.
“Hmm,” said Dad. “Sounds like you need some sugar yourself.”
“Me? What are you talking about?” asked Gianna.
“Well, like sugar, love is a key ingredient,” Dad explained. “If you give Mrs. Grahame a cake without love, the gift would be like a sugarless cake—not very sweet! It needs to be sweetened with the love of Jesus. Everything He’s done for us—like dying on the cross for our sins—has been out of love, and He tells us to do everything with love too.”
Gianna looked at the cake mixture. “I…I guess I was just doing this for my class at church instead of for Jesus,” she admitted.
“Trust Him to help you love Mrs. Grahame like He does,” Dad told her. Then he winked. “And always remember to taste your mixture before you bake it!”
-Emily Lauridsen
How about you?
Do you help people? Do you do kind things for others? That’s great. But why do you do them? Is it because you want others to notice the good things you are doing? Is it because you’ll feel bad if you don’t? Or do you do them out of love? It’s possible to do the right things and yet miss the key ingredient—love! Only Jesus can give you that ingredient. Trust Him to help you do everything in love the way He does.
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