The Crock-Pot Gospel: How God Roasted a Skeptic’s Heart
- Gods Biscuits Official
- Jan 1
- 9 min read
The first thing you would notice about Bob isn't his stature—he was a good head shorter than me—but the immense gravitational pull of his personality. At seventy-two, he was built like a retired dockworker: stocky and solid, with a magnificent crown of silver hair and eyes that missed nothing.
He was a Jewish art gallery owner in Marietta, Georgia, a man who spoke in pronouncements rather than opinions and regarded argument as a form of pleasant conversation. Truth was not merely something he sought; it was an opponent he intended to wrestle into submission. His humor was abrasive, his spirit larger than life, and his skepticism, particularly regarding matters of faith, was his default mode of expression. He supported local artists with fierce loyalty but mocked prayer with equal vigor. In a word, he was exhausting. And in July 2023, he hired me.
At the time, I was a forty-five-year-old marketing and branding expert. My uniform wasn’t a power suit and stilettos; it was and still is flowing silk skirts and soft cashmere: armor that allows for both creativity and comfort. I am a study in contrasts: logical and creative, bold and kind, a smoker with strong, unshakable faith. I adapt my communication style to each client, a necessary skill when your clientele ranges from Southern gentlemen to avant-garde artists.
I met Bob serendipitously while consulting for a leather goods store owner. Bob was a random customer visiting our tourist town. He was direct, almost brusque, and after a five-minute conversation detailing everything wrong with his Salesforce conversion, he demanded my card. I gave him my website and instructions as a test of his genuine interest. He passed.
The marketing audit he commissioned for his gallery was a journey into beautiful chaos. His methods were charmingly outdated, a relic of a bygone era when a newspaper ad and a firm handshake constituted an entire campaign. He possessed the wisdom of seven decades, but in the digital age, that often translated to seven decades of outdated practices. The irony was not lost on me: age does not automatically confer wisdom in all matters, only experience, and sometimes that experience is simply a long history of doing things the hard way.
He needed a complete organizational overhaul, a digital presence built from the ground up, and someone with the patience of a saint to endure our six-hour-long, circuitous, and wonderfully combative strategy calls. He was a hard-headed client, but his passion was genuine, and that’s a currency I understand.
The chaos reached its zenith during the final stages of opening his new contemporary gallery space. The pressure transformed him into a whirlwind of anxiety, overwhelming his small staff and his long-suffering wife. In a moment of desperation, he hired me for a high-intensity day trip. I swooped in, my keen eye for narrative and detail shifting from marketing copy to visual curation.
The task was Herculean: over three thousand contemporary fine art pieces, a cacophony of color, texture, and concept, all needing to be organized into a coherent, flowing narrative for his soft-opening showcase. It required a deep, instinctual knowledge of art history, color theory, and emotional pacing—knowing exactly where to place a jarring abstract piece to make the serene landscape that follows resonate even more profoundly. In twenty-four frantic hours, we curated one hundred pieces. The show was a success, a testament to controlled chaos and keen instincts.
Emboldened, Bob kept me on to build his website, manage holiday marketing, streamline ads, edit videos, and impose order on his chain of command, which was less a chain and more a plate of spaghetti. We scheduled a follow-up visit for December. As I prepared for the trip, a memory surfaced: the sheer, unadulterated chaos of the last visit. There had been no time to eat, no space to breathe, only delivery apps and cold sandwiches hastily consumed over a keyboard. Then, an unbidden and bizarre thought arrived: bring your crock-pot.
My large, 10-quart crock-pot was a stalwart companion. It felt ludicrous. My car was a small coupe, and every inch of space was precious, reserved for presentation materials, my laptop, and a single suitcase. The idea of dedicating a significant portion of the passenger footwell to a bulky kitchen appliance seemed professionally absurd. I argued with the impulse. It was a small, silly thing. Yet the directive was persistent, a quiet but unwavering nudge in my spirit.
So, I did what I always do with a persistent idea: I took it to prayer. It felt childlike, almost embarrassing. “Lord, should I really bring my crock-pot?” The answer wasn’t a thunderclap but a profound, settled certainty: “Bring the crock-pot.” I was reminded of the obscure promise in Philippians 4:6 (NIV): “...in every situation, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.” It clearly says every situation. Apparently, that includes crock-pots.
Bob’s wife, a gentle Christian woman with the patience of a saint, drove north to pick me up in her spacious white van. The two-hour ride to Marietta, that quirky art-town oasis outside Atlanta, was filled with pleasant conversation. There, on the floor between my feet, sat the crock-pot, its silent presence a strange act of faith. When we arrived at their stunning modern brick loft—an open floor plan with large windows and high ceilings—I carried my mysterious cargo inside. Bob eyed it from his kitchen counter, which was looking for breathing space.
“Why on earth did you bring a crock-pot?” he asked, his voice a mix of curiosity and bemusement.
I set it down on the counter with a definitive thud. “God told me to,” I replied, my tone matter-of-fact.
The room fell silent. His wife, who had been putting away travel bags, paused. A look of dawning realization crossed her face. “Bob,” she said, her voice soft with significance, “that expensive rib roast—the one in the fridge—needs to be cooked tomorrow, or it will spoil. And with our gallery schedule, there’s no way we can babysit an oven for hours.”
The absurdity of the moment was palpable. The empty, mocked crock-pot had, in an instant, become the most essential item in the loft. Bob’s face was a masterpiece of shifting emotions: confusion, skepticism, and a dawning, bewildered awe. His eyebrows rose to his forehead. He looked from the pot to me, then to his wife, and back to the pot, as if expecting it to sprout wings and sing a hymn.
He was stunned, utterly disarmed. The fact that the crock-pot had saved the day was one thing; the stated reason for its presence was another. “God told you to bring it?” he repeated, the words foreign on his tongue. The irony was thick enough to sculpt. Here was a man, a formerly devout Jew who once called God “Abba,” Father, who had long since stopped praying, now confronted by the tangible results of a prayer he would have mocked days before. And the messenger was a marketing consultant his Christian wife had essentially prayed into his life. For days, it became his refrain. He’d pause while discussing website copy, look at me sideways, and ask, “He answered you? About a crock-pot?”
His bewilderment was hilarious.
I couldn’t fathom his stumbling block.
Why wouldn’t He? Isn’t that the whole point?
Why would the CEO of the Universe, the Architect of Spacetime, concern Himself with the culinary logistics of a small art gallery in Georgia? Doesn’t He have wars to prevent and galaxies to spin? What is the service protocol for a divine pot roast request? Do you submit a ticket?
The slow-cooked roast was, and I do not say this lightly, divine. It was tender, flavorful, and perfectly cooked, a testament to low heat and patient timing. It sustained us through a grueling weekend of final preparations. We ate it with biscuits I had prepared, our fingers greasy and our spirits lifted. We worked, drank wine, and leaned heavily on the crock-pot’s magic. That humble appliance became the silent, reliable hero. The meat itself was crafted not just by my hands but, I believed, by a Father who delights in feeding His children. The scene was a perfect contrast: the bright, white-walled gallery with its black ceiling and large storefront window, filled with challenging contemporary art and the sound of live jazz, all fueled by a homespun meal born of a seemingly silly prayer.
Throughout my two trips, Bob’s methodology became clear. He couldn’t conceal his voice inflections and micro-expressions. He dissected my psychology, probing for leverage. Adopting a fatherly tone, he pried for personal details to create a bond, then expertly wielded that bond to elicit guilt, securing extra work that saved him thousands. He was a masterful manipulator, part of a charming breed who love-bomb and control conversations, all while believing their tactics are unique and undetectable. They are not.
At the trip’s end, following the successful winter show, we sat at his heavy wooden kitchen table for a long-promised “talk.” It was midnight. The table was positioned in front of large windows that opened onto a dark balcony, our reflections staring back at us from the glass. I felt a growing annoyance, a weariness from the emotional manipulation and the constant psychological chess match.
As it turns out, that was our last in-person conversation. It’s strange how God can orchestrate a marketing audit, an art curation marathon, and a culinary miracle, all seemingly just to deliver one stubborn man a message at a wooden table at the witching hour.
Over a glass of rich red wine, he finally asked the question that had been haunting him: “Why would God care about something as small as a crock pot? He has wars and bigger things to worry about. He’s busy.”
I took a sip, meeting his gaze in the window’s reflection. “Are our stomachs not important?” I countered, my voice calm. “Why would our Father not care if His children have good food to eat? Is that not a primary concern of any good parent?” I admitted that I, too, had once thought it silly to pray over a kitchen appliance. The feeling was a persistent push, a holy nudge I chose not to ignore.
I told him I knew he would react exactly this way when I explained why I brought it, but my obedience wasn’t about his reaction. It was about mine. “I knew none of this,” I explained. “I didn’t know about the roast. I didn’t know we’d have no time. I only knew to bring the pot. God knew the rest.” I continued, feeling the strange reversal of roles, the child teaching the old man. “Nothing is too big or too small for our Father in Heaven. He knows the number of hairs on our heads. Why would He not know the number of quarts in our crockpots?” I was channeling the spirit of Matthew 10:29–31, the assurance that not even a sparrow falls without the Father’s notice, and that we are worth far more than sparrows.
Bob was silent, truly perplexed for the first time since I had met him. The concept of a God who micro-manages was a paradox he couldn’t resolve. Yet, he couldn’t deny the evidence: he had witnessed God’s magic, not in a parting sea or a burning bush, but in a prayer and a pot roast. He realized that God’s wonder isn’t reserved for grand, global designs but is intricately woven into the small, mundane details that bring a smile to His children’s faces. Like any loving parent, He delights in their joy, especially when they are gathered together, well-fed and content. There is a whisper of heaven in gravy and grace, an echo of Genesis 18:8, where Abraham served his divine visitors under the tree, and they ate. Communion happens at tables, large and small.
This is my testimony. It is not grand and does not include healed diseases or lives rescued from impending doom. Instead, it features a crock-pot. Many people say they don’t have a testimony, but I believe they overlook everyday miracles because they lack the faith to recognize them.
How can you have a divine pot roast without first having the faith to ask for it?
That night, God didn’t part the Red Sea; He served a meal. Genesis 18:8—He served them under the tree, and they ate. A whisper of heaven in gravy and grace.
Bob didn’t convert. He didn’t raise his hands. But he saw. And sometimes, seeing is the first sacrament.
This is my testimony—not grand, not dramatic, just true.
A crockpot, a prayer, a roast that shouldn’t have been—and a man who remembered that God still serves dinner.
I did not win the argument.
I served a meal.
And in the end, grace does not shout.
It simmers.
Quietly.
Until the entire world smells like heaven.
As Colossians 4:6 says, “Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.”
This simple appliance brought a moment of wonder to a stubborn old Jewish man, serving as a tangible sign of a Heavenly Father’s meticulous care. If you don’t believe this, perhaps you have never dared to pray over something small and seemingly insignificant. Your lack of faith might be the very thing preventing you from seeing God’s divine magic in the mundane.
How can you have a divine pot roast without faith?
I urge you to pray over the small things in your life—your commute, your meetings, even your awkward family dinners. Pray over your crock-pot and experience the joy of divine, unexpected provision. Approach Him not as a distant CEO, but as your Divine Dad. Father.
Always be ready to give an answer for the hope you have, doing so with gentleness and respect (1 Peter 3:15), even if that answer smells like slow-cooked roast and requires you to haul a ten-quart pot across state lines. The journey from doubt to obedience is often ironic, hilarious, and profoundly transformative. It is a story written not in lightning, but in the steady, warm glow of a crock-pot’s light.
AUTHOR: God's Biscuits Founder
LOCATION: United States
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