“I want to tap into this freedom to try things out and put myself out there and not always succeed, and to be okay with that.”

Joy Cho, Clinton Hill

After losing her restaurant pastry job due to COVID-19, Joy Cho has seen doors open up for her that she never knew existed.

“I lost my pastry job in New York in mid-March. I had transitioned from communications to full-time to pastry in August 2019 and started working at a restaurant I’d really wanted to be at, and then after seven months, COVID-19 happened. After the restaurant closed its doors, I bought a one-way ticket back home to Columbus, Ohio, not sure how long I’d be gone.

Pre-COVID, I’d reached a point where I almost wanted to walk away from God and church. I wanted to be free of feeling guilty and shameful about certain sins and struggles, and I thought that by walking away from God, I would find that freedom. That didn’t happen at all. Even as I was trying to escape from my guilt and shame by turning away from him, I couldn’t feel free from those things. I was stuck in a middle ground and I was pretty miserable. Part of me was bothered by the fact that I couldn’t let go of God fully — I thought that life would be so much easier if I could just do a 180 and walk away, but for some reason, I couldn’t.

When I came back to Columbus, I felt a little lost. I wanted to feel useful and to spend my time the way I love, which is in the kitchen. Initially I was just baking things and had extras and would deliver free baked goods to people I knew. And then I was like, Would people pay for this? And can I develop a cadence where people could order from me on a weekly basis? That’s how the Baker’s Box project started. Every week, I made an assortment of baked goods that people could pre-order and then I would deliver it to them the following week.

Honestly, I didn’t know where it would go. I didn’t know how many people would be receptive or if it would just flop. It started small, with people from my church who knew me ordering stuff, and then orders started growing, and then I just cold-emailed a bunch of breweries and got to do collab Baker’s Boxes using their beer, and made dessert for a private dinner at a local wine bar. I also started food writing when the content director of my pastry school emailed me out of the blue, saying they could pay me for articles since I was no longer a student. It truly amazes me that God knew exactly what my interest areas were, and somehow He allowed me to explore so many of them.

I remember my first cake order back in Columbus — it was this random person from church who called my grandma and then asked to talk to me, and asked for a wedding cake. And that was the day that I was actually supposed to cater a wedding in Chicago that got postponed. So I ended up doing a wedding cake anyway, on the same day that I was supposed to have made dessert for another wedding.

I don’t think there was a clear marker of when things started to shift in me spiritually. I wish that it was a linear process, but it hasn’t been. A lot of the struggles I had in New York followed me to Columbus, and even now I’m still in it. But when I think of all this undeserved provision, one thing I can’t deny is that all these things were from God.

I’ve experienced patches of discouragement and self-doubt back in New York, even though it’s only been a few weeks. I find myself succumbing to anxiety and the constant drive to “make things work,” and I’ve definitely idolized the hustle. As someone who puts a lot of pressure on myself, it’s easy to drive myself into working and wanting to succeed right away, and it’s really tiring.

But God has a track record of being so gracious. There’s a verse I read last week: “And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work.” All these little things like people reaching out for one-off cake orders I didn’t expect, a pop-up coming to fruition after cold-emailing the owner back in March, or finding a $500 check I’d never cashed while cleaning — it’s like God saying, I’m still working and providing for you and you don’t need to worry. And I want to tap into this freedom to try things out and put myself out there and not always succeed, and to be okay with that.

At the same time, I don’t want to think of God as only my provider and sometimes I feel guilty that He’s giving me good things. But I’m learning that that is who He is, and He wants to give me things and open doors and bless me. It’s really not about me. All the opportunities that God has given me these past six months, things I wouldn’t have ever imagined — like making a cake for someone on SNL or pitching an article to a food media outlet or getting face-time with guests at a brick-and-mortar pop-up — it’s not like He feels obligated to provide these things or like I did anything to deserve it. It’s just His grace, you know — grace upon grace.”