In birth order, Granddaughter Number Two recently boosted my ego by asking about one of my dessert specialties.
"Grandma," she wrote in an email, "would you send me the recipe for your rhubarb cream pie? I'm hungry for it and I've been telling my friends about it."
It took me little time to type out the list of ingredients and instructions and fling them out into cyberspace.
Last week I thought of that conversation again and added this mental note to self: ask Sarah about the picture she promised to send of that pie. As we chatted via Skype this week our conversation provided the answer.
"The filling was delicious," she exclaimed and went on to tell how everyone gobbled it up. "But we couldn't eat the crust."
Now you have to understand that I am constantly complimented on the flavour and flakiness of my pie crusts; how her version needed a fork and knife to cut it or, alternately, a good snap to break it into pieces, was confusing to say the least.
"Sarah," I asked, "did you cut the lard into the flour until it resembled fine crumbs?" That's when she paused.
"Lard? There was nothing about lard in the recipe," she said. My question answered, we howled with laughter. The new version definitely merits a photo.
I've thought about that "faux pas" quite a bit this week, thought of how the omission of just one ingredient makes all the difference between success and failure.
In our daily walk with God there is no such thing as an unimportant component and be assured, He doesn't burden us with wrong information.
"But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law." Galatians 5:22,23
Any missing ingredient makes a noticeable difference.