Holy Jalapeno!

Never in my life have I been accused of being funny. Sure, I would get lucky once in a while and make a humorous comment. One time my mom was talking about the white elephant game my family plays at Christmas time. She wasn’t sure if she could play because she didn’t have a “white gift”. With all seriousness I looked at her and said, “All gifts matter, Mom.” This was during the Black Lives Matter riots, and my comment elicited an auditory laugh from my sister. I am not making light of the Black Lives Matter movement, so don’t give in to the spirit of offense. What I am saying is, as much as I love to make people laugh, I rarely do that with my wit and wisdom. Therefore, in order to get my mom and me to lighten up one day, God chose an unusual way to get our attention!

Mom and I recently attended the Opening the Heavens conference in Omaha. The weekend was filled with great speakers! From Kent Christmas to Samuel Rodriguez and many in between, we learned deep new truths about the Bible. We were encouraged by prayers for our nation and given new hope with prophetic words. I learned so much my brain hurt!

On the last day of the conference Mom and I ate lunch at Olive Garden. As we discussed the deep topics of the weekend, I pulled a grape sized jalapeno from my salad and pressed on it with my fork to sever it from the stem. All of a sudden, a fire hose of jalapeno juice erupted from that little fruit. It shot straight up in the air, and I promise you, the girth of the stream was measurable! My first thought was, “Wow! That is a lot of juice for a little jalapeno!” My second thought was, “Oh please don’t hit her in the eye!”

Now, I am as uncoordinated as I am not funny. So, I winced, disappointed in myself that I couldn’t even eat in a sophisticated manner. When I looked up, Mom had her eyes and her lips pressed tightly shut. Her shoulders were bouncing with laughter. What I thought was one gusher of juice was actually three geysers of jalapeno juice that had doused her hair, cheek, and blouse! Mom had just taken a bite of food and was trying hard not to spit it out in her surprise! When I saw her laughing, I realized how funny the situation was, and I began laughing. We laughed so hard we couldn’t speak for a few minutes. Between our conversation on prophetic movements and our uncontrollable laughter, I’m sure the other tables thought we were completely crazy!

When she finally got her breath back, Mom said, “Well, I guess the Lord wanted us to lighten it up a little bit,” and she was right. Yes, God wants us to remember he is holy. Yes, he wants us to live righteously and obey his commands. After all, in 1 Peter 1:15-17, it is written, “But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do; for it is written: ‘Be holy, because I am holy’.” Our Lord definitely wants us to be serious about the sin in our lives and be heartbroken for the sins of others. However, God also wants us to enjoy life as well. Our heavenly Father created this world and everything in it. He loves what he created, and we are part of that. You enjoy watching a loved one open gifts on Christmas. God loves watching us enjoy his creation and the life he gave us even more! So yes, confession and repentance are real and necessary, but so is laughter!

Sarah said, “God has brought me laughter, and everyone who hears about this will laugh with me.”

Genesis 21:6

He will yet fill your mouth with laughter
    and your lips with shouts of joy.

Job 8:21