Burnt Pizza

I burnt the pizza.

For those of you who know me well, you know that it’s not a really big surprise, because I don’t usually spend a lot of time in the kitchen. I don’t burn food often, but it’s definitely not the first time I’ve done it. This time it just hit differently.

It’s hard to describe, but this time it felt like a failure. I know it probably sounds a little strange or a bit extreme. After all, it was dinner for my family and not an elegant occasion.

There was still a feeling of failure. Like someone was counting on me, and I let them down. A real fear of mine is not being the person those closest to me need and/or deserve.

As I was thinking about the eventful evening, I saw how distracted I was at the moment. While I knew there was pizza in the oven, I also focused on the dirty dishes piled up in the sink. It hadn’t been long since I had checked on the pizza cooking, but obviously, it was too long. Smoke was pouring out of the oven, and there was the smell of burnt food which we had to open the windows in order to air it out.

All of this to say, what an evening.

How often do I get distracted every day? Too busy with too many excuses rather than spending time with God? Too much on my mind that it drowns out my ability to hear from God?

Unfortunately, I know myself. I know I get distracted, easily letting my mind go 100mph (or faster) while simultaneously trying to handle all of the things. Maybe you do too. If I learned anything from burnt pizza, it was that God is in all the details of my life.

It may seem completely ridiculous that I would sit and think about some burnt pizza, but I have. I was reminded that moments are fleeting. Time truly passes too quickly, and what I choose to do with my moments is up to me.

I heard CeCe Winans say, “As believers, we don’t lose.” In God’s eyes, I am still enough even if I burn the pizza. And you are too. May we become men and women who are so focused on God that the love of Jesus freely radiates from our lives to those around us. It’s not too late. You’re not a failure.

Psalm 90 - Modern English Version

Lord, You have been our dwelling place in all generations.

Before the mountains were brought forth, or You had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, You are God.

You return man to the dust and say, “Return, you children of men.”

For a thousand years in Your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a night watch in the nighttime.

You carry them away as with a flood; they are as a dream, like renewed grass in the morning:

In the morning it flourishes and grows up; in the evening it fades and withers.

For we are consumed by Your anger, and by Your wrath we are terrified.

You have set our iniquities before You, even our secret sins in the light of Your presence.

For all our days pass away in your wrath; we end our years with a groan.

The years of our life are seventy, and if by reason of strength eighty; yet their length is toil and sorrow, for they soon end, and we fly away.

Who knows the power of Your anger? Or Your wrath according to Your fear?

So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts to wisdom.

Return, O Lord, how long? Have mercy on Your servants.

Satisfy us in the early morning with Your mercy, that we may rejoice and be glad all our days.

Make us glad according to the days that You have afflicted us, and the years that we have seen evil.

Let Your work be displayed to Your servants and Your glory to their children.

Let the beauty of the Lord our God be upon us, and establish the work of our hands among us;

yes, establish the work of our hands.