Precious Potatoes

Fredrick the II or better known as Fredrick the Great of Prussia was considered one of the greatest military minds of all time.  He is considered one of the greatest rulers of all time.  One interesting story about Fredrick is that he wanted to introduce new crops to Germany, so he introduced the potato to his people.  IF you ever notice, the potato at first glance is an ugly (dirty) vegetable that does not appeal to people right from the start.  The Prussian people said, “No thank you”, and were unwilling to grow the potato because no one wanted to eat it.  Some farmers were arrested for not growing potatoes.  So Fredrick (being a very smart tactician) declared the potato a “royal only” vegetable; that the potato was too good for ordinary people.  Therefore only the royal farms could grow them and only royal people could eat them.  He then planted royal potato farms and put guards out to protect these potato crops.  Fredrick said to his guards, “Protect these potatoes, but don’t protect them very well.”  Next thing you know, people went from hating potatoes to stealing potatoes; because if it is a royal food, it must be pretty good.   What Fredrick did with the potato was to rebrand it.  It’s not just some dirty ordinary vegetable; now it was a royal food.  And that which was despised became deeply desired. 

Consider the words of Peter…

“4 And coming to Him as to a living stone which has been rejected by men, but is choice and precious in the sight of God, 5 you also, as living stones, are being built up as a spiritual house for a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” 1 Peter 2:4-5 NIV

Just as the potato was rejected, so was Jesus.  He was rejected at first.  However by faith, a rebranding of sorts occurred in the minds and hearts of some of the very people who had first rejected Him.  They had no idea that the pain and heartache in their lives was due to the fact that they were trying to live without the Son of God.  Once people realized Jesus wasn’t just some average man, they began to see that He was the best of all men; more than that, He was royalty, the Son of God.  That changed everything for people everywhere, because Jesus is not a man to be rejected.  Instead, He is the most precious of all of our relationships.  Some days we reject Jesus; we leave him out of our schedule thinking that we have more important things to deal with, that we don’t have time for Him.  Those tend to be our worst times, the days in which we try to live without our Savior.  Maybe we need to rebrand the way we see Jesus, because He is not just some man or some trivial idea that we can discard.  He is royalty.  He is the most precious of things.  Only through Him can we become royalty (children of the King), eternal, righteous, enjoying His everlasting grace and peace. 

-Vic