Finding God in the Flavor Lab

I’m thrilled to have Annette Uza, a friend from church, kicking off a new series of blogs about how people find God in their work. These guest posts will run on the 2nd and 4th Tuesday of each month. Subscribe on the right to get these posts delivered directly to your inbox. And, if you have a story to share, I’d love to hear it! 

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On my fifty-third birthday I realized that my dad was only four years older than me when he died. As I faced the possibility of meeting Jesus than soon, my position as Director of Productions in a flavor company suddenly lost its appeal. I wanted my life to matter for eternity, so I decided to resign and find a job where I could really serve God.

I applied for a chaplain residency program and for the next two years clocked fifty hours a week at the hospital before dashing to both of my part-time jobs, one at the flavor company. I worked every weekend and holiday without a single day off. The schedule nearly consumed me, but as I sat in the emergency room with family members, holding their hands and praying with them while their loved one lay on the trauma table getting bullets extracted and head wounds stitched up, I believed my work mattered to God in a way that my old job never could.

Did I love my work as a chaplain? Not particularly, but I relished knowing that God saw my sacrifice and the work I did for him. I loved nestling my head into the pillow each night knowing I’d told my patients about God.

So last summer, when I graduated from the program, I expected God to drop a full-time position into my lap, at a hospital, church, or hospice. I sent out application after application, but as the months dragged by God didn’t move. 

I’ve sacrificed so much for you, I pled with him. No vacation for two years, not even holidays with my boys. Surely, you saw my sacrifice and faithful preparation. Surely, you’ll give me a ministry. 

As God stayed silent, I rummaged up new job postings and struggled to make ends meet. Then, one day, my boss approached me with a full-time position he wanted me to fill. The company purchased some of its extracts pre-made, but these were expensive and he wanted me to research alternatives and develop them from scratch.  

While the prospect of full-time work tantalized me, I wrestled with God. I quit my full-time job so that I could work for you. Why would you just send me back? But as I prayed, I knew God wanted me back in the flavor industry. 

I walked into the lab, my new office, confused with God, but not for long. My boss assigned me to the pineapple project. The extract we purchased from another company cost too much and he wanted me to create my own formula. I poured over books until I found twenty base chemicals that, when mixed in the right proportions, can replicate the taste of pineapple. With beakers and pipettes cluttering my workspace, I began concocting.

I started with six chemicals, none of which smelled like the fruit. Some stank and others smelled like dirty feet. I added chemical #1 and #2 and took a whiff. Nothing familiar. Some drops of #3 and I jerked my nose away. Pee-yew. A bit of #4 and I found myself back in the land of something fresh and fruity. A splash of #5. No change. I stirred in #6 and a sunny smell, ripe and warm, wafted towards me. Pineapple!

It took me days of research, trial and error, and measuring droplets religiously to get a whiff of pineapple. But all God did was say, “Let the land produce vegetation: seed-bearing plants and trees on the land that bear fruit with seed in it, according to their various kinds” (Genesis 1:11), and a pineapple appeared. Not just that, a pineapple appeared that could seed more pineapples, so that thousands of years later I could pick one up in the grocery store. And, not just pineapples—bananas, blueberries, mangos, lychee, and more. One sentence and God made all that, but it took me days of research and pinching droppers just to replicate one smell. This makes me worship. 

That’s how I found God in my lab, on the pineapple project. Now I wake up for work, prepared to be amazed by the Creator, ready to worship as he unfolds his wonders on my lab bench. 

During my stint at the hospital doing “God’s work,” I failed to realize that all work is holy if our heart points to God while doing it. I don’t have to be holding a patient’s hand as they die alone, abandoned by their family, to be working for God, although he stills calls me to love my neighbors, coworkers, and the lady at the grocery store. But I can also serve him in the lab. And if I die in the next couple years like my dad did, I know that in addition to the people I’ve loved and told about Jesus, God will also smile over my vocation as a flavor researcher.

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