The Parable of The Cheesecake (with appropriate apologies to The Cheesecake Factory)

Have you ever been to The Cheesecake Factory?  Their menu is enormous, 20+ pages of choices.  It takes fifteen minutes just to read the menu.  But while you’re reading, they bring you some of the best wheat bread in the world.  The secret?  A little molasses.  You’ll eat the bread, and ask for more, and go home and wish you had eaten more.  SO good!  You might be inspired to go home and make bread yourself.  You might tweak your own recipe, tasting and trying different variations.  You may go back to The Cheesecake Factory to try theirs again, making your bread match theirs.  Eventually, you get it just right.  Your bread is every bit as good as theirs, maybe even a little better.

But you don’t get just the bread when you go to The Cheesecake Factory.  You choose something from the giant menu to eat with the bread.  The food is so good that you order the same thing every time you come.  You read the whole menu, certainly, but you always order your favorite.  You can taste your entrée before it comes.  You love it, and you know how to eat it. 

One day you decide, just because, to try something new.  You still get the bread, and you still make it at home.  You’ve tried your old favorite a few times at home, too.  It’s time to do something different.  Turns out, this new entrée is delicious, too.  It becomes your new favorite, and you eat it until you know everything there is to know about that dish.  You can’t possibly eat every item on the menu at this lunch, but you can really love these two items.  Someday, you’ll be ready to add another entrée to the list of things you eat.

The doctrine of Christ is kind of like the menu at The Cheesecake Factory.  There is a lot to read, a lot to learn, a lot to take in.  You can’t take it all in at one meal, or one lesson, or one General Conference talk.  Someone else may tell you how much they love family history, or temple work, or whatever, but you may love and be particularly good at being friendly with your neighbors, who you love.  Good for you!  Loving your neighbor is part of the doctrine, and you nailed it.  Excellent!  That is the bread, and you can spend as much time as you need perfecting your bread, whatever it is.  When you’re ready, you choose the next thing to work on, and spend as long as you need perfecting that.  The whole menu doesn’t disappear, but you have wisely chosen, with guidance from the Lord, what you will work on today, and this month, and this year. 

The Cheesecake Factory also has cheesecake to die for.  Every flavor is better than the one before.  In the Eternal plan, Jesus offers to buy you a slice of cheesecake every time you eat.  Sometimes we feel too full for the cheesecake, or too overwhelmed to feel our Savior’s love, but He will always offer to buy it for us.  The cheesecake is always there. 

Eat the cheesecake.  Whatever other menu items you choose, whatever you are perfecting at this moment, eat the cheesecake.  Let Jesus fill your soul with love and light.  Don’t worry about the rest of the menu, there’s plenty of time to try all the entrées, and appetizers, and side dishes.  They will come in the right time, when you are ready to try them.  But always eat the cheesecake.  After all, it’s free!  Jesus bought it for you.