Growth in Any Relationship Means Having Grace & Love, Especially When the Pumpkin Soup Explodes!

Posted on Oct 08, 2021 Topic : Inspirational/Devotional, Women's Christian Living
Posted by : Sarah Philpott

About a month or so into our marriage I made plans to surprise my farmer husband with homemade pumpkin soup—created with a pumpkin he had grown in the garden. Never had I ever cooked a “real” pumpkin, but an online search led me to some very specific directions. I’ll admit, the process was advanced for me (a gal who still wasn’t confident in the egg-boiling process) but, in the pursuit of delighting my husband, I grabbed a butcher knife and went out the front door to chop up the pumpkin I planned to cook!

I toted the halves of pumpkin inside, placed them on a baking sheet, and threw them into the hot oven. Hours later, self-impressed with my newfound homemaking skills, I removed the now soft pumpkin from the heat. And thought to myself, wow! I was going to make the perfect wife for a farmer; perhaps culinary school would be in my future! All that remained was the easy part: pureeing and then pouring the orange goodness into the pot. A few ingredients later and I would have created a gourmet farm-to-table dish, or so I thought. I placed the cooked pumpkin into the blender and pressed on the “puree” button. Blender humming. Pumpkin pureeing. It was a sweet sound of success.

But then, with an eruptive, volcano-like force, the top of the blender burst into the air. Liquid pumpkin spewed everywhere! Puree splattered my face, my hair, my apron-clad body, every countertop, cabinet, and floor surface in the kitchen. I frantically reached for the power off, but it was too late. The white cabinets my husband and I had just revived with fresh coats of paint were now covered with orange puree pumpkin.

Dining on pumpkin soup was not in our future unless we licked it from the walls and ceiling. I crumbled to the floor, completely aghast that I had failed to properly latch and secure the blender top. It was about this time my husband came in through the screen door. Finding me, sitting on the floor in our pumpkin-covered kitchen. He assessed the scene of the disaster. And focused his gaze on his new wife, who was wearing defeat with a crown of pumpkin puree.

“Have you been in here, just sitting in your defeat?” he asked. As I lifted my head from sorrow, he let out a small light laugh, lifted me off the floor, and swooned over my pumpkin soup efforts. Without ridicule or anger about the gigantic mess we now had to clean up, my husband lifted my spirits by showing me nothing but love.

It made me think… “How often do we in the relationships closest to us, spew accusations and rudeness instead of blessing our loved ones with gentleness and understanding? How often do we focus on the mess of the matter, instead of protecting the matters of the heart?”

It would have been easy for my husband to scold me for wasting the pumpkin he had invested so much of his time growing, or make fun of my cooking disaster, or simply tell me it was my mess to clean. But he didn’t. He simply extended his hand and his heart in love and laughter.

As I sit here now having just celebrated our seventeenth anniversary, I think about how marriage is a lot like a tiny sprout springing forth from the soil. It needs nurturing and love, not breaking or stomping. In fact, all relationships, either marital, familial, or friendship—flourish best when provided an abundance of love, grace, and support. I will admit, the homemade pumpkin soup would have tasted better served in a bowl, but truly the pumpkin splattered all over the walls provided me early on in my marriage a lived-out version of Christlike love.

It’s the type of love our preacher had read scriptures of during our marriage ceremony: Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; ^it does not rejoice at wrongdoing but rejoices with the truth.⁷Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. (1 Corinthians 13:4-7, ESV).

Our best lives are lived when we choose to act upon the true definition of love, by abundantly lavishing patience and kindness to others- especially to our spouses, children, and parents. When you see that someone you love is feeling defeated lift them with your words and actions. Sitting in the middle of my pumpkin soup splatter, I realized that the best cure for defeat is love and support. And I then resolved to extend that kindness to others.

I’ve still never made homemade pumpkin soup. But I think I might just put that on our fall menu this year to try again. The pumpkins are ready to be picked and it’s time I reclaim this dish and finally (with lots of grace) get to serve it beautifully, and of course, in a bowl!