Tonight's Dinner and Other Foody Thoughts

Tonight I made a blackened chicken pasta.  It had diced mushrooms and roma tomatoes and bacon in a white cream sauce with about 8 different spices, served over linguine.  It was one of the best things that I have made in awhile.  It required a sink full of dishes to create, but it was well worth it. 

Sunday I spoke about how Jesus liked a good meal.  He ate with Pharisees, sinners, tax collectors, and disciples, and would it times it seems invite himself over to somebody's house.  See: Zacchaeus, the wee bad little man.  I'm sure that it was in part about being with people, but I also wonder what it is that he liked to eat. 

There's something very, very important about food in God's creation.  Almost every culture has their own customs about eating and dishes that they eat...but because eating is so fundamental to life every culture seems to take it seriously.  I remember seeing the old futurist shows in which people would get their nutrition through little pills, and it's more ridiculous as I see how important food is.  It's not that I want to be Anthony Bourdain and eat the strangest of things in the strangest of places (strangest, of course, being a fully relative thing), but I enjoy food in its many forms. 

I wonder if Jesus enjoyed more than loaves and fishes and olive oil and wine.  Did he ever eat any precursor to pasta?  Or tortillas?  Or chocolate brownies?  I wonder how much he would have enjoyed my blackened chicken pasta tonight.  I think he would have, but he probably would have split it up into 5000 other portions while he was enjoying it. 

A Year With Jesus: Questions #2 (kid edition)

As I continue to think long and hard about what it must have been like to spend time with Jesus in the flesh, I have more questions for his, but this time for when he was a boy growing up in Nazareth. 

-Did Jesus ever roll his eyes at something his parents said?  Did he ever complain to a friend about how unreasonable they were being?
-Did he ever tell his half-brothers and sisters to shut up?  Did they ever do the same to him? 
-If Jesus was the oldest of his mother's sons, did he have extra responsibilities in taking care of his siblings? 
-When he was a toddler, did he sit in his father's lap and pass gas and then say, "I fart on you!" and laugh uncontrollably?
-Did he ever play a practical joke on a friend?
-Did he ever flex or stand up taller when a cute girl walked by?
-Did he have acne?  If so, what did he do about it? 
-Did his parents ever find lice in his hair?  Did he ever have to get his head shaved as a result?
-Did Jesus ever look up at the stars at night and think, 'That one was my favorite to create?' 
-Did Jesus ever play street games with his friends?  Was he good?  Did he ever get beaten badly at something at then sulk for half an hour? 
-What was his best friend's name when he was 10?  What did that friend think about him? 
-Did Jesus and his friends ever have a competition to see whose pee would fly the furthest?  Who won? 
-When Jesus' baby teeth came out, did his parents do anything special to reward him? 
-Did he like to climb trees?  Did he ever fall out of one and break an arm? 

Again, these questions may seem weird or disrespectful to some.  But his fully humanity makes me wonder. 

A Year With Jesus: Questions

On Sundays through this year I am preaching from the gospel of Luke a series entitled, 'A Year With Jesus'.  There is so much in those few short chapters that I have way too many sermons to fit into 52 weeks...but still, there are a lot of other questions I have if I really did have a year to spend with Jesus. 
-If Jesus was a carpenter like his father Joseph, did he ever hit his thumb with a hammer or cut himself with a saw?  What did he scream if this happened?
-What kind of food did Jesus like?  Did he complain that his fish wasn't seasoned?  Would he have liked tacos?
-While Jesus surely would have loved Donald Trump, would he have considered Donald Trump a true follower?  Or what of Barack Obama?  The pope?  Jerry Falwell, Jr? 
-Did Jesus ever look out at an audience while he was preaching and see a woman and then have to pause to catch his breath because she was so beautiful?
-Did Jesus ever on accident step in donkey poo while walking down the road? 
-Did Jesus ever have a thought flash through his head while looking at Peter, "Man, that dude smells like fish."?
-When Jesus preached in the synagogues, did he ever get impatient waiting for the people praying to finish so he could get up and preach?
-Did Jesus ever have food stuck on his face or beard?  Did any of his disciples reach over and brush it off? 
-Did Jesus ever look in a looking glass to check out his hair?  Did he smell under his armpits?  Did he ever walk back into a room to adjust an off-center tunic?
-When waking up in the morning, did Jesus have a stiff neck or a bad back?  Did he have morning breath? 
-Did Jesus ever have to break up a fight between his close disciples?  Did he have to take Simon the Zealot and Matthew the tax collector and put them on opposite sides of the room to make them calm down?
-What would Jesus have thought about television?  About movies?  About our culture of entertainment? 
-Did Jesus ever do a spit take because something around him was so amazingly funny?
-What did Jesus dream about?  Did he have nightmares? 
-Did Jesus ever have to deal with a woman who threw herself at him sexually?  How did he get out of it? 
-Did Jesus read things besides the Torah, prophets, and writings?  Did he have a favorite book? 
-When working in his carpenter's workshop, did Jesus ever realize that he made a mistake in measurements and have to throw out something? 
-When Jesus was twelve and spent three days alone in Jerusalem at the temple before his parents found him, where did he sleep and eat?  Who took him to their home? 
-Did Jesus enjoy a good poop or pee as much as we do?  Did he ever leave the spot he relieved himself at with a leaf stuck to his sandal? 
-Was there anybody Jesus loved but never really liked that much?  Did he ever see somebody walking towards him and inwardly groan? 
-What was Jesus' favorite weather season of the year?  Was he more about winter or summer or spring or fall?

I know that some of these questions sound ridiculous, if not scandalous.  He is our Lord, of course...but as he was fully human, would not these things have been very real possibilities?