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Today, I am excited to introduce my son Malachi as our guest blogger. Malachi is a sophomore at Harvard University, concentrating in Religion and African American Studies.

PJCR

When I was the rock collector in residence at Sarah Smith elementary school in Atlanta, I read a Bible three times. It was primarily a transactional endeavor.

You see, the amount of pages I read determined how many Read-A-Thon Book Credits I would earn, which in turn determined the color of the ribbon I would receive at the end of the contest. (It also influenced how much money some parents would donate to the school, which I was not considerate of at the time.) As a blue ribbon type of person by nature, I eagerly sought the maximum page count.

Two versions of the Bible—the Jesus Loves Me Bible by Angela Abraham and the Day by Day Begin-to-Read Bible by Karyn Henley—were my secret weapons: At just over 400 pages a pop, they collectively were good for a solid 28 Book Credits, almost a third of the price of a blue ribbon. I, a smooth ReadA-Thon criminal, somehow failed to mention that they were also mostly pictures.

This past summer, I decided to, at last, open one of the many actual Bibles gifted to me in my days as a Preacher’s Kid. One Tuesday in May, I sat down with a Bible given to me on the day of my baptism, and viscerally encountered the danger of Holy Scripture misunderstood. This is what I read:

“II have given you every plant with seeds on the face of the earth and every tree that has fruit with seeds. This will be your food.

I, like a preacher who believes that they have just said something profound, read the verse for a second time. I circled This will be you food, an unsettling declaration, and recorded the verse—Genesis 1:29—in a grey journal aptly titled “Faithbook #1”. I was puzzled. Was humanity meant to be vegan?

The potential of yes was difficult to digest. I was, after all, the same Malachi that had once tiptoed to the refrigerator under cover of night, delicately pried the door, and clawed chunks of butter onto my infant tongue. Now, it seemed, God had condemned me to margarine.

Thankfully, I kept reading. Everything that lives and moves will be your food. I gave you green plants as food; I now give you everything else. The words read like shade on a hot day. I don’t remember the moment exactly, but I imagine that my reaction went a little like: God gave Noah the rainbow sign, and what’s more He told him butter is fine. Genesis 9:3, you delicious beauty you, you took my worry n’ led it right to the tomb. It was a good day.

A few weeks later, Ice Cube resurrected my stomach’s anxiety. I was seated in the backseat of my Mom’s car while Mr. Corey (my stepdad) surfed the radio. As he hunted for the right tune, I caught the snippets of rejected songs:

And Momma cooked a breakfast with no Hog. Hmm,

I’ve definitely heard this before, but not by itself. What does it mean?

Let’s see. Hog. Nah.

Pig? Charlotte’s Web?

Not by the hair on my chinny chin chin!

Nope. Swine? Swine. Don’t cast your pearls to swine.

Hold up, that’s in the Bible somewhere, right? Ok, let’s not overthink this Malachi, Ice Cube is a rapper not a theologian and—

Warm smell of carnitas, rising up through the air.

Now this is getting weird. Two pork-themed radio fragments in under a minute. And isn’t “Hotel California” an allegorical mediation on Hell?

This can’t be good. Is God trying to tell me something? Maybe He wants me to give up pork. After reading Isaiah 65:4, which names the flesh of the pig a forbidden food, I did just that.

For 74 days, I abandoned that beautiful strip called bacon. For 74 days, I had no neck bones for my greens. For 74 days, I had no pork for my beans. And then, one fine morning, I was freed. I

t’s not what goes into your body that defiles you; you are defiled by what comes from your heart.

I was on vacation when my Bible flopped open to that verse—Mark 7:15. I had not intended to read it then, but the Lord knew that I needed it. He had sent me others— Ecclesiastes 2:24, Romans 14, Galatians 5:4—but I had not gotten the message then. No, I believed that my new diet was ordained, my abnegation holy.

As if barbecue were the price of eternal bliss.

As if Heaven were a ribbon I could earn with an empty stomach.

No, eternal life is no transaction. It is freely given.

No, Holy Scripture is not a reading contest. It is a spiritual guide meant for slow, careful study.

If we do not learn patience, If we accelerate through scripture in search of absolutes, in pursuit of popular shortcuts, we risk much more than the food we love.