COFFEE! COFFEE!! COFFEE!!!

  Photo of coffee beans by Lazarescu Alexandra on Unsplash.                                                                      

There is more to coffee than coffee!  It’s liquid love!  It brings up memories of my wife and I having coffee at Starbucks with my adult son or daughter, or friends.  It greets me in the morning with its warmth.  It over-shadows my morning mouth and stimulates this old body…..yes I can now face the day!!!!!!  Listen to what others say: 

“I love coffee. I sometimes get excited at night thinking of the coffee I’ll get to drink in the morning. Coffee is reason to wake up. There are other reasons, of course. But coffee is the incentive, at the very least.”  Annie Clark.
“Coffee smells like freshly ground heaven.”  Jessi Lane Adams.
“Coffee. Creative lighter fluid.”  Floyd Maxwell.
“Love is in the air and it smells like coffee!” Anonymous.
“I have measured out my life with coffee spoons.”  T.S. Elliot.                                                                                           

We sure love our coffee!   

Speaking of Starbucks, I noticed a diagram on the wall of a coffee cherry, the fruit of the coffee plant that contains the coffee beans growers roast to make our favorite brew.  The cherry has six layers surrounding the two beans contained in its center.  These beans are actually the seeds of the coffee plant.  My wife said that the coffee cherry needs to have so many layers to protect her favorite brew!  She’s right.  Several layers do indeed give the coffee beans protection from damage with names like the exocarp, the skin or outer layer of the cherry and the silver skin, the fine inner layer that coats the beans.  Other layers give the bean nourishment.  The endosperm surrounds the beans and is responsible for providing nutrients including starch, proteins and oils and the endocarp that provides rich sugars and serves as an essential energy source.  

Guess what else I found out.  You are not going to believe this, but according to elevencoffees.com, ‘a coffee plant naturally produces caffeine as a PESTICIDE to protect itself!!!’  Well, it doesn’t work with us!  We go after those coffee beans with a vengeance!   

The protection, nourishment and ‘love?’ contained in a coffee cherry from the ‘Book of Nature’ is a metaphor for a scriptural admonition found in the book of Ephesians.    

‘Finally, be strong in the Lord and in His mighty power.  Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.  For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.  Therefore, put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand.  Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.  In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one. Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.  And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people’. Ephesians 6:10-18.

We also need ‘layers’ of protection, not from bugs and worms, but from the devil himself and all his ‘schemes’.  The Apostle Paul calls this protection, ‘the full armor of God.’  He admonishes us to: ‘buckle the belt of truth around our waist’.  Put the ‘breastplate of righteousness in place. ‘Take up the shield of faith’, put on ‘the helmet of salvation’, and pick up ‘the sword of the Spirit.’  In other words, know the truth, (Jesus) who is ‘the way, the truth, and the life.’  John 14:6, accept His righteousness, ‘which is given to you through faith in Him’, Romans 3:22, ‘The Ultimate Camo’, live by faith, ‘the just will live by faith’, Romans 1:17.  ‘Take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ.’ 2 Corinthians 10:5 and above all, know the word of God and use it as Jesus did to defeat the devil!!!!,
Matthew 4:11.  You become vulnerable when you don’t know and use the word of God to fight your enemy the devil.  As the scripture in Hosea says, ‘My people are destroyed from lack of knowledge’.  Hosea 4:6. 

And what is extremely interesting, this same word of God gives us nourishment!  ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that comes from the mouth of God’.  
Matthew 4:4. 

So now we have protection and nourishment, just like the Coffee Cherry!  WHY???

In the coffee cherry, it is all for those precious coffee beans we love so much, but we protect and nourish ourselves so that we can ‘stand with our feet fitted with readiness’ to share the seeds of ‘the gospel of peace’ we carry!   These seeds bring abundant and eternal life to those who receive the seeds we bear!!!!!  So much more than a good cup of coffee!

By the way, how about inviting the Holy Spirit to share that cup of coffee with you tomorrow morning!   

My wife brought me a cup of coffee in bed, and I wrote this poem.

Another Cup of Coffee
Its warmth
Transferred to my set upon
Handkerchief
Drawn to my face
I felt it 
Embraced it
Like her love
Liquid and warm
Inside and 
Upon my face.