July 7, 2017 (Friday)
Today is National Chocolate Day. If you like the idea of a “Chocolate Day,” then you”ll be glad to know you don’t have to wait a full year for another one, because February will be “Chocolate Lovers Month.”
Chocolate in one form or another can be found in most of our homes. Some people are allergic to it, but most folks love it. The History Channel’s “Modern Marvels” series has a program all about chocolate, and it explains that chocolate comes from beans nestled inside cacoa pods (large pods 6-10 inches long and 3-4 inches in diameter) that grow only in the moist, warm climate of equatorial regions. Quite a long, involved process, including fermentation, is required before what we recognize as chocolate is derived. The program is well worth watching.
Most of us love chocolate but we’re not very interested in its source. Our interest is in the finished product, and it takes many forms. How about chocolate milk? Hot chocolate, sometimes called “cocoa,” is the delight of some folks. Chocolate cookies. Chocolate cake. Chocolate ice cream. Chocolate candy. Sometimes we call the finished candy product “a box of chocolates,” and recall Forrest Gump’s quotation from his mother, “Life is like a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re going to get.”
Back in my childhood days, whenever I would get sick with a fever, the doctor always prescribed quinine. It came in an amber square bottle with a cork at the top. Ever hear the expression, “bitter as quinine?” It was bitter, but to make it easier to swallow they added chocolate to the children’s prescription. I was willing to endure the bitter quinine for a taste of the sweet chocolate. Reminds me of Mary Poppins’ “spoonful of sugar that makes the medicine go down.” And that one makes me think of the old saying, “You catch more flies with honey than with vinegar.” All of a sudden our conversation has led to something different from chocolate, but in the same family of ideas.
That reference to honey made me think of Ephesians 4:32, “Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you” (NIV). It doesn’t hurt us to be nice to folks. We may even want to offer them some chocolates.