The Miracle Fruit

Sermon Starter

by Leonard Sweet

Mark 8:31-38
 
"Miraculin." If you haven't heard of it before, you'll no doubt hear of it in the future. 
In fact, you will probably be invited to a "miraculin" party someday.

"Miraculin" or "miracle fruit" is a small berry that grows on a plant in West Africa 
that looks like a rhododendron. The technical name is the "Synsephalum dulcificum" plant. 
It looks somewhat like a cranberry, or when unripe a coffee bean, and has a slightly citrusy taste. 
[If you can order some in advance from this website, and get people to try it as part of your sermon, 
or after the service, so much the better. Check out http:www.miraclefruitplus.com] 

But the "miracle" about this "miracle fruit" is not what it tastes like. The miracle is what it makes everything else taste like. 
Hold the berry in your mouth for thirty seconds, chew it up but keep it on your tongue, and feel a kind of tingle. 
After swallowing the berry take a big bite of a lemon or lime or grapefruit. Instead of sour, 
those fruits taste incredibly sweet. For about an hour, which is about how long miraculin lasts, 
you can turn raw lemons into lemonade with no sugar. Your salami sandwich can taste like Sara Lee. 

Or: Eat a miracle berry then toss down a big shot of vinegar. To your confused taste buds 
the vinegar tastes as sweet as Mountain Dew. 

Oh, I forgot something. When the vinegar hits your throat it burns all the way down. 
The glycoprotein molecule called "miraculin" only binds to the tongue's taste buds, 
fooling the receptors into identifying acids as "sweet." Your throat still knows an acid when it feels one.

Now do you know why these berries, now in capsule form, are the new thing in parties? 
If you bite into a big lemon wedge and instead of puckering you up it floods your mouth with super sweetness, 
it is not just your tongue that is confused. Your brain doesn't get it either. 
What is just plan fun and freaky for your mouth is termed "cognitive dissonance" for your brain. 
And too much cognitive dissonance can drive you seriously crazy

(from http://www.sermons.com)