Never thought I'd think a rat could be lovable, but while my little grandson sat in his car seat in the van waiting for his mom, we watched the movie, Ratatouille, and I was hooked.
The creators of the wonderful cartoon characters made it believable that a rodent could perch on the top of a garbage boy's head and guide him into creating fabulous recipes for the French dining establishment where the rat's young human friend worked.
Disaster struck, and the garbage boy became the chef. The kitchen crew scrambled about with worry when a food columnist announced he was coming and would rate the food. I understood completely because I wrote a pile of newspaper food stories myself when I was in Lifestyle and we rated different dishes around town occasionally.
It was totally believable when the health department came to close them down, because I've been with environmental health workers as they inspected restaurants. One of our fast food restaurants was closed for a while because one customer found a dead mouse in her chili. Turned out the mouse probably met his demise in the tomato canning factory.
Yet, I was overjoyed when Remy the Rat and his helpful friends escaped from the inspectors and sad when they closed the Parisian Restaurant where the rat and the young chef made fabulous ratatouille, a delicious vegetable dish. Yet, there was the happy ending when the rat and his friend opened another restaurant and the food critic was their best customer.
The theme of the movie is "Follow your passions."
Now some passions are worth pursuing and others are not. Some passions have the capacity to destroy our lives and send us directly to hell. But when you know the Lord, He places a passion in us to know Him, to tell others about Him and the abundant and eternal life He gives. We hunger and thirst after righteousness and are miraculously filled with the peace and joy that goes along with it.
Often the Lord gives us a passion to develop and use our talents for Him and to bless others.
The Message Bible highlights the Psalmist's words: "Wait passionately for God, don't leave the path. He'll give you your place in the sun while you watch the wicked lose it (Psalm 37:33-35).
I believe that God gives each of us a passion that Divinely and Rightly fits with every other passion around us. For example, Remy's passion was cooking, but he wouldn't have been much of a cook without his human helper. We're all like that. Yes, I write, but without readers, it wouldn't be as much fun. Maybe you build houses, but once you got yours built, it wouldn't be much fun to build them for nobody. The passions God gives always fit a need for someone else. That's why it's so tragic to hold back our passions, to squander them, to deny them, to fight them. In doing so, we choke off one more way God can speak into someone else's life. So help someone else out... Go live your passion today! :)
ReplyDeleteSo true Staci! You added some important things for us to remember. We need one another.
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