You are not the same as those who don’t believe. So don’t join yourselves to them. Good and evil don’t belong together. Light and darkness cannot share the same room.
2 Corinthians 6:14
This evening I baked a new-to-me banana bread called Banana Bread Maui. I'd never even heard of it until today, to be quite honest.
The recipe was a fairly typical banana bread but called for finely chopped pecans and coconut on top of the batter.
I love pecans and coconut so I figured I would love this recipe. But, because I can never leave well enough alone, I decided the batter needed one more component--some other type of fruit.
I went with blueberries. I happened to have a pint on hand. So, in they went, as if they belonged there.
Which, it turns out. . .they didn't.
The banana bread baked up fine. . .and looked beautiful from the outside.
However, when I cut a slice, I thought the bread was raw on bottom. It looked dark and damp.
Only, it wasn't. It was exactly the same moisture as the rest of the bread but the berries had sunk and discolored the bottom half of each slice of the otherwise-lovely bread. And even though the berries tasted okay, they were just that. . .okay.
I found myself regretting the decision to add them to the recipe.
Some Things Just Aren't Meant to Go Together, Are They?
Take light and dark, for instance. You can't have one when the other is around. They were never meant to dwell together--just like blueberries were never meant to go into Banana Bread Maui.
We try so hard to merge things together that simply don't belong.
- Relationships with people who bring us down.
- Jobs that tax us to the breaking point.
- Commitments to things we were never meant to do.
Maybe it's Time to Analyze
Have you allowed any proverbial blueberries into your life? Are there relationships that are discoloring things, bringing regrets?
Are there decisions you wish you could change, situations you'd like to get out of?
It's Never too Late to Separate Light from Darkness
I don't know what you're going through or who you're going through it with. But I do know that some things aren't meant to go together.
- There might be relationships you need to end.
- There could be a commitment you have to get out of.
- There could even be a job you should pray about ending.
When you remove the offending blueberries, the story is no longer discolored. Perhaps this is the day to discover just how tasty things can be without them.
Let's Pray
Lord, for the many times I've allowed things into my life that were never meant to be there, please forgive me. I've settled for relationships with people who've pulled me away from you. I've over-committed to things that weren't Your will for my life. I'm blindly walked into situations that I wasn't meant to participate in. Today I ask for Your help as I take a step toward undoing all of that. Amen.