Life is like a cantaloupe, it needs to have enough zing to be interesting and sweet enough to give flavor.

The secret of growing a good cantaloupe, one everyone desires, is to have it grow in hot days and cooler nights. The hot days plentifully develop the robust sugar level in the cantaloupe, and the cold nights allow the sugar to slowly distribute in the fruit to have a full rounded flavor. If the days are not hot enough, the tartness and sugar are weak – right color and feel, wrong message. If the nights are not cold enough, the flavor is erratic, spotty and not to be savored.

I find a parallel to the raising of a good cantaloupe to the reading aloud of Bible (or other spiritual book) passages. The preparation needs to be hot, inspired with glowing embers of spiritual ideas. Then the presentation needs to be a cool, articulated, and comprehended reading that allows the message to understandingly penetrate the reader’s thought and thus to be savored by the soul.

Good fruit. Good message.