You’ll Taste What You’re Cooking (Proverbs 12:14)
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Proverbs 12:14
From the fruit of his mouth a man is satisfied with good,
and the work of a man's hand comes back to him.
Whenever I read this verse, I always find myself thinking deeply on the second half:
‘The work of a man’s hand comes back to him’.
In Proverbs, we have seen the snare of the tongue. We’ve seen how dangerous our words can be – they can trap us, harm others, and stir up conflict. But here we see the other side: its blessing, not only to others, but to ourselves.
‘From the fruit of his mouth a man is satisfied with good,
and the work of a man's hand comes back to him.’
You know, I’ve had the privilege the past few years to chef it up and grill at a place called the North Carolina Study Center at UNC, the home for Christian thought on campus – and every time I cook, I always take the chance to, as I call it, ‘taste the delicacies’.
It’s always important to taste your own work, and I love tasting whatever I’ve made. It’s similar to our lives and our words, because whether we want to or not, we will ‘taste the delicacies’ of our lives.
Maybe better said, you’re always going to have to taste what you’re cooking – with your words, and with your life.
We will taste the fruit of our mouths, whether good or bad, and the work of our hands will come back to us, whether good or bad.
As the Scriptures tell us, ‘we will reap as we sow’.
So the question that comes to mind whenever I meditate on this verse – I guess it’s two, actually – is:
What fruit am I planting with my words?
What kind of soil am I working with my life – and what’s growing from it?
The good news in all of this, of course, is that for the work of the soul, the ground which is tainted with sin, Christ finished the greatest work of redeeming it by living the life and dying the death we could not, bearing the weight and burden of our sin on the cross.
Back to the kitchen, some of us have burned meals behind us – words we regret, things we’ve done we’d rather forget. But Jesus stepped into our kitchen, so to speak, and prepared a table of grace. He did the work we couldn’t. He gives us a new recipe to follow – one rooted in love, humility, and truth.
Let’s pray.
