Turkey Soup

I do not claim to be a cook, and I don’t particularly like to cook. It seems like a lot of work for something that is over in ten minutes. When does the fun start? I have pretty low expectations for what I call a successful meal – one in which no one has to go to the hospital. (After I have cooked for guests, I’m convinced someone will come down with food poisoning.) But for some strange reason I like to make turkey soup from scratch, which takes time, makes a mess, and generates a ton of leftovers, all of the factors which would normally make me run the other direction. This Thanksgiving my niece’s husband carved the turkey as well as anyone I have ever seen, getting almost all of the meat away from the bones. I took the remainder of the bird home to make soup, even though it might have to be vegetarian. I couldn’t believe how much meat was still available! Perhaps that’s what I like: salvaging what was trash, looking at it from a different perspective, and finishing with a one-of-a-kind soup filled with wild rice and barley, carrots for color, and any spice that seems half-way applicable, including jalapenos.

My prayer for the congregation?

Dear God, You are the great creator! Where others see discarded and spent people, you see a chance to salvage a life and restore them to their own beauty. It takes imagination and work to rebuild, and often it’s easier to start from nothing than to break down, clean, refinish, and polish a dirty, worn, damaged item. You never turn away from hard work nor a long rehabilitation. We are all able to give more than we imagined and you have a way of bringing that out in us: we can feed more, clothe more, and love more, from what we already have. As we reach to find the unused portions, let us sing more, laugh more, and praise more to your glory. Amen.