God Tastes Series

Taste is a powerful experience

There are four taste sensations: Sweet, Salty, Sour, and Bitter

Chocolate!

I think there is another… chocolate! Right now I’ve asked some folks to hand out some Hershey Chocolate Kisses – one to a person. Please don’t open them yet. We’re going to eat them all together in just a minute.

(Pass out chocolate kisses.)

Can you imagine a world without chocolate? What would it be like? I think it would be a lot like Pleasantville – you remember the movie where everything is in black and white. The world was essentially all different shades of gray – no color – until they discovered love.

Well, in my humble opinion, that’s the world without chocolate – just shades of gray. Chocolate brings all kinds of color into the world. There is the American cuisine: Hershey’s chocolate bar, Reese PB cups, Milky Way, Snickers, and the top dog of American chocolate – the M&M. The biggest argument you’ll get between two American chocolaholics is which is best – plain or peanut. Or for some it is the Hershey kiss!

Chocolate is impossible to describe. You can talk about the appearance – with a shiny glossy look and the snap – that clear crisp sound made when you break a good quality chocolate. You can try to describe the mouthfeel, (which, believe it or not, is a technical term for how a food feels in the mouth) whether it is smooth, grainy, or gritty. You can try to explain how one chocolate is creamy and another is waxy. You can try to tell someone about that initial burst of flavor, the soft melting of the chocolate in your mouth and that wonderful aftertaste – but you can never really get close to the reality of experiencing chocolate – especially that first time.

Do I have your attention? I’ll bet your mouth is watering!

Think of what it would be like to taste chocolate for the very first time.

(Taste chocolate kisses.)

Put one in your mouth – but don’t chew it. Let it melt there and enjoy the texture and taste the richness of the flavors…

A soldier in WWII tells of giving a young child in France a Hershey Bar. This particular child had been raised in the center of a war zone and had never tasted chocolate in his entire life. The soldier tells how the child was very tentative about accepting the gift and then had to be shown how to unwrap the contents. But when the child took his first small nibble his entire face changed. The tiny boy was enraptured. It was like he was saying, “where did this come from? – the world has something good in it!”

Some things simply have to be experienced to be understood. We begin this morning with our understanding of Jesus. John writes and describes to us who he really is.

Jesus Tasted Eternity

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning.

John 1:1-2

“Defining Jesus,” said Max Lucado, “would be a challenge to the best of writers, but John handles the task with casual analogy. The Messiah, in a word, was ‘the Word.’ Be He a fiery verb or a tender adjective, He was, quite simply, a word.” And I might add that He was “just the right Word!”

David Owen in "The Word." on www.sermoncentral.com.

When you read this don’t think of a “word” in the English language sense. Think of the idea of someone giving you the “word”. Logos – literally means the message. Jesus is the message from God to us. He is God’s equivalent of a “Heads Up” shout from one player to another on the ball field or when the golfer yells “fore” to announce the sudden and unexpected arrival of a golf ball.

Jesus is the message from God to us and he was with God at the very beginning of all things. In the beginning was the message. The message of God was with God. The message of God – was God himself.

Jesus Tasted Eternity

3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of men. 5 The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.

John 1:3-5

Now in the next few verses look at the evidences of the Godlikeness of the message…

Jesus was there when God rolled galaxies off his fingertips and pushed red dwarf stars into black holes with his a flick of his little finger. Jesus set in motion the sun, the moon, and the clouds above the world. Jesus imagined with God the animals that wander the planet we call earth. Jesus was present and he created it all with his word and by his power as the Almighty God.