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Best of Community: Creating Beauty with Coffee

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This week we are highlighting some favorite posts from our faithful community of writers.

I don't have far to look to find beauty at work. Granted, I have three workplaces: at home with my children, at "the office" (a coffee roasting and supply warehouse) and at the coffeeshop/microroastery my husband and I own in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania.

At home, I'm surrounded by a lovely, mundane beauty—the messy, routine-y, giggly, up-and-down, fantastic everyday richness that is life with little kids. They are image bearers, so they reflect (even when I fail to appreciate it) the beauty that God is and has infused into His Creation. There are plenty of voices out there revealing that particular beauty, so I'll let it lie for now. I want to talk about a different created beauty, complete on its own but enhanced by the work of millions of people worldwide. It's the thing in the corner of creation entrusted to me, my family, my coworkers, and my employees: coffee.

There is an obvious beauty in coffee—that first sip in the morning after a long night that makes you "aahhh" while you thank the powers that be that this warm, rich caffeine delivery device exists. Outside the mundaneness or necessity, there is beauty in the comraderie it inspires—the ambiance of your local coffee shop; the taste, smell, and feel of a cup carefully brewed; and the latte art poured by the skilled barista.

Then there's a layer beneath the obvious. For us roasters and baristas who hand you the finished product, it's the people BEHIND the beans. Hundreds of people work together to bring the coffee from seed to cup. They cultivate, grow, prune, water, weed, harvest, ferment, and dry the beans. They transport, sort, process, grade, bag, cup, and export those beans. They import, sell, roast, and brew them. All of these people, many in developing countries, are made in the image of God. All of these people were made to reflect God's beauty and are absolutely worth our thought, consideration, and love as we serve the product they poured their best into.

There's yet another layer of beauty to find at work here: the people in FRONT of us. We're called to love our customers as neighbors and image-bearers, and to give them our best. So we educate ourselves on what's going on in the industry. We search for great coffees, fine-tune our methods, and push ourselves to be the best baristas we can. There is beauty in that striving—the creativity, the work, the pleasure of serving a drink you made with so much care to another person and seeing them enjoy it.

Crafting coffee and espresso is skilled labor and requires much of the roaster and barista. It's inspiring for us as laborers to work with and create beauty everyday for others.

Finally, in yet a deeper layer of beauty, we change the world with coffee. I know it sounds idealistic and cheesy, but it's absolutely true. So many people are affected by our choices when it comes to coffee. An entire small village can get by for a year on the sale of their harvest to one roaster. That roaster can provide jobs to several people, and the coffee shops and restaurants it supplies provide jobs to baristas, excellent coffee to its customers, and immeasurable benefits to their neighborhoods. One cafe can impact an entire community locally and and another one (or several) globally.

To me, that co-laboring and enjoyment of so many people around the world, all from the same humble little fruit isn't just beautiful. It's downright gorgeous.

This article is part of The High Calling series, Creating Beauty at Work. While brightly painted walls or sleek, modern furniture might lighten our mood and inspire creativity, investing in the people we work with, helping them to bring the best of who they are and caring about them even when they can’t, is at the heart of a beautiful workplace. Are you or someone you know feeling a little lackluster about your work environment? Before you buy a new framed print for the wall, try complimenting your cubicle mate or saying thank you to the janitor. Or start a conversation with a coworker by emailing or sharing one of the articles in our series.

Author bio: Bethany is a coffee professional, wife, mother of three, and community advocate in Beaver Falls, Pennsylvania. She and her husband run Beaver Falls Coffee & Tea Company, where they seek to create a place that serves exceptional things, opens conversation, and nurtures neighborhood. She's a big fan of cheesy space shows, British television, crochet, and chocolate.

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