“Taste and see . . .” – Psalm 34:8
For one of the meals when our family was gathered during the holidays Tee prepared a large casserole dish of lasagne, an easy one-dish meal that can feed a big crowd. And besides, who doesn’t like lasagne? It seems our five-year-old granddaughter, Eliana, didn’t, or didn’t think she did. She wanted no part of it, not even a marcel, fearing it might contaminate her plate. Eventually, though, after some coaxing from her parents, they convinced her to take a small bite. And guess what, first she discovered that it was not poison, and that it was actually quite tasty.
Eliana’s resistance to trying something new is nothing out of the ordinary for small children, nor for adults for that matter. Haven’t we all done it? Her daddy, a life-long foodie, may be one of the few exceptions to that. When he was about eight-years-old a large group of us were having dinner one evening in a restaurant where we were served raw oysters. Now what little kid dares to try those slimy things? But Marc did, and after being carefully instructed to swallow it quickly, what did he do? He began to chew – and chew, and chew! Napkins were being shoved toward his mouth from every adult at the table expecting the oyster, plus everything else he had eaten along with it, to spew from his mouth any second. Much to our relief it was only the oyster he calmly spit back out.
I have no idea to this day whether my son has ever eaten another oyster, nor whether our youngest grandchild will grow up liking lasagne, but I give them both credit for trying something different. For how else do we learn unless we taste and see? “You should read the book I just read,” we suggest to one another, or “you should go see the movie I just saw.” Otherwise, we are inadequate in explaining the content of the book, or what takes place in the movie. Some things we must experience for ourselves.
John’s Gospel tells the story about Philip going to find his friend Nathanael. “We have found the one Moses wrote about,” he tells him, “Jesus of Nazareth, the son of Joseph.” “Nazareth!” Nathanael responded, “Can anything good come from there?” “Come and see,” said Philip. . . “Lasagne!” my young granddaughter might well have said, “Can this stuff be worth eating?” “Taste it and see,” her parents coaxed, just as the Psalmist had, “Taste and see that the Lord is good.” Indeed, taste and see, experience it for yourself.