There is an old saying: Give a man a fish, feed him for a day. Is that all we hope to do with a hunger ministry? I dare say the next part of the axiom is better: Teach a man to fish and feed him for a life time. But I believe there are more parts to this saying that we rarely hear: Introduce the man to the Creator of the fish (and himself) and feed him for all eternity! But how about we add: teach the man on the journey to be a fisher of men himself (that would be the fulfillment of the Great Commission) and next he would have opportunity to take seriously his stewardship of the pond? That man (or woman) would then have opportunity to recognize God’s sovereignty in their life, their community, and His purpose for them in this world.
How is a ministry in His name able to only serve food to the hungry and not say that this food satisfies for a time but as it is given in the Name of Jesus Christ — he cares for your physical needs and your spiritual needs at the same time? Life is short; let them have the choicest morsels! Some call that dessert. I call that serving Christ.
Frankly, (like a two sides of a coin) serving the Hungry is about two issues. Serving bread to feed the physical stomach is only one aspect of addressing the needs of the hungry. To be really fully fed the person must also have a portion of the “Bread of Life” to make the transaction a purposeful endeavor and to keep the reason for feeding them relevant to the responsibility we take very seriously from our Lord to feed the hungry. The whole story is in Matthew 25:35 and following: “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat. . .”
In, John 6:35 then Jesus declared, “I am the bread of life. He who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty.” Do we really believe that?
This begs the question – why would we think we should have audience with hungry people without first helping their stomachs to stop growling “speaking” louder than any words that might be spoken. Certainly, their physical hunger inhibits their ability to hear us?
But more importantly — how do we feed them the Bread of Life without making them feel that they must respond to the message in order to get fed? Or would sharing the Gospel be a violation of the “rules” imposed by the source of the food we use – such as the network of food banks?
The rules set up by the food bank say that you cannot make the persons’ receiving food contingent on their participation in a religious program. Do you think Christ would have required them to sit through an evangelistic message before they’d have access to food? But that rule does not mean that there are not ways to share the gospel part and parcel with delivery of goods. Creativity is the watchword, not just a tract in a sack of groceries. While there have been instances where persons have come to know the Lord through tracks that does not promote a personal relational response to the gospel. And, if we cannot figure out how to share the gospel with the restrictions of the food bank – then frankly, perhaps we need to consider not using the food bank and obey God first and trust Him to provide! Remember, he is the one who multiples Loaves and Fishes?
The Lord, the Bread of Life, is not an afterthought in Hunger Ministries. He is the sole (truly “soul”) reason we would feed hungry people in the first place!
Especially, for Pastors and those of you have opportunity there are a collection of sermons at:
http://www.seedspublishers.org/worship/speaking-of-hunger-sermons-of-challenge-and-hope/
“This collection of sermons is sponsored by the Alliance of Baptists (AOB) and produced by Seeds of Hope. For a number of years, Christian leaders in the anti-hunger movement have been calling for a cache of sermons about hunger. This year the AOB has enabled Seeds to pull together this collection.”
By: Tomi Lee “T.L.” Grover, PhD.
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