Drive Thru…
Now we are cooking!!!!
Week of May 2, 2010
Over the past few weeks we have had a lot of media people asking questions about Covenant, walking through the warehouse, and asking for interviews. Of course the reason is because of the miracle of Nadia Bloom being found alive. One of our prayers was that we would be able to help the Bloom family tell their story, that we would have interactions with others along the way that would honor God, and that we would interface with the media in ways that would point toward Jesus. As I reflected back over the calls, contacts, e-mails, and surprise visits from various news organizations it dawned on me that 90% of the requests that were made of us we answered with a “no.” For a variety of reasons we just couldn’t or didn’t feel led to honor most the requests that came our way.
However, over a two week period we had 6 different local media outlets and all three network news agencies here at CCC. Some of them actually were a part of our worship events. One of the things I have heard over and over again is just how innovative, honest, refreshing, and real our celebration worship events were. One camera operator dropped by one evening and spent some time talking about the things we said in worship the Sunday before.
I was told about an article in Fast Company that I had to track down about one of the most innovative chefs in America, Homaro Cantu. The article said, “Cantu and his passel of wacky young chefs are coming up with fresh ways to tweak the restaurant’s wildly innovative menu at a rate that would make a corporate creativity consultant lose his lunch.”
They have weekly brainstorming sessions where they dream up new ways of cooking and serving food. Let’s just say that they use everything from a Class IV laser typically used for surgery and liquid nitrogen.
Cantu is a rebel chef “who loves to challenge a diner’s assumptions about how food should look, taste, and feel.”
That brings new meaning to the whole concept of a TEST KITCHEN
Cantu has taken it to new extremes. They have a “quirky lust for the unexpected–the desire to push the culinary envelop by combining flavors, texture, and temperature in previously unimagined ways.”
For example, they serve donut soup. It tastes exactly like the inside of a Krispy Kreme donut. One chef is experimenting with how to cook ice cream so it becomes powder when you eat it. Another chef is trying to fry ketchup so it’s cuttable. And Cantu is experimenting with edible menus.
Diners are asked to “abandon their preconceptions about food.” Cantu and his rogue chefs are even experimenting with utensils! Who said a spoon or fork is the best utensil with which to eat?
So what makes Contu such a remarkable chef? He combines the fresh and the familiar. Cantu is all about “imagining startlingly original ways of presenting and reconstituting food.” It is all about “the deconstruction of a comfortable, memory-evoking food and its resurrection in a totally different presentation.”
Ah that makes sense (you are thinking…I knew you were)
Actually you are probably asking, “is there a point to this?”
Glad you asked….Here at CCC we are trying to do our best to nourish you as followers. Trying to add to your diet the stuff that will supplement what you are doing and help you grow. As we plan Celebration Worship we are serving up 52 menus a year… And that spiritual diet must not just nourish. It must taste good.
As I teacher I pray that I would say old things in new ways.
I want to deconstruct comfortable truths and resurrect them in ways that make people think in new ways.
Jesus did that with parables. He was creative, innovative, relational, and said things that left His listeners astonished and amazed. I have prayed that God would help me approach teaching with the same level of intensity and ingenuity as Homaru Cantu.
In Visible, Vibrant, and Vital I wrote about the importance of being salt and light. Remember what Jesus said in Matthew 5:13?
“You are the salt of the earth. But what good is salt if it has lost its flavor?”
Pass the salt…I think this past couple of weeks we have been able to be salt and light to the world in ways we had never had the chance before. I think we made the Father smile and I am so thankful for the miracle we got to be a part of.
Thank you for being who you are and thank you for Whose you are!
Jeff
Add your thoughts to these thoughts.
e-mail Jeff at jdixon@touchandchange.com