If you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then you light will rise in the darkness and your gloom by like the noonday.    (Isaiah 58:10)

13 Billion Pounds

Thirteen billion pounds! Not one billion. Not ten billion. Thirteen billion pounds! This is approximately how much edible food is thrown away in the United States each year (Some estimates are much higher!!). I could make a ludicrous comparison as to how many blue whales equal 13 billion pounds, or how much the Empire State Building weighs, but the fact of the matter is, grocery stores and delicatessens and restaurants and public institutions, and yes, even common households; we are all lolling in the same boat while those around us and far away are drowning in starvation.

When they had all had enough to eat, he said to the disciples, "Gather the pieces that are left over. Let nothing be wasted" (John 6:1)

There are estimates that at least 700 million and possibly up to 890 million people in the world today suffer health problems related to hunger. To put this in its proper perspective, think of every man, woman and child in the United States, our entire country's population...and multiply it times three.

Why is my pain unending and my wounds grievous and incurable? (Jeremiah 15:18)

Fifty-five percent of the world's population sits down to a "meager" meal every day. A meager meal is defined as rice and water. Thirty percent of the world's population sits down to a "simple" meal every day. A simple meal is defined as rice with perhaps beans or bread and butter...and water. So, to do the math, eighty-five percent of the world's population eats less food per sitting than is included in a Happy Meal at McDonalds.

Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord. (Psalm 130:1)

For those of us in the remaining 15% who profess to be Christians, we are compelled through our faith to provide hope and change for "the afflicted". There are literally dozens of scriptures to support the simple notion that we should be providing food, kindness, justice and love to the hungry, poor, oppressed, and bereaved.

If a brother or sister lacks food and one of you says, "go in peace," and yet do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? Faith if it has no works is dead. (James 2: 15-17)

If we deliberate on James' scripture, we are obliged to ask the question, "Is our faith dead?" The next time you sit down to a meal of soup, bread, salad, two vegetables, meat, and perhaps a dessert, think about your brothers and sisters half way across the world who are sitting down to a pad of rice and a half a cup of water. As Christians, can we ever look at food the same again?

Dear Heavenly Father,
            Thank you for the gift of your creation, this world, although we freely acknowledge that we have been poor stewards of it and often selfish in our ways. Please urge us with the words of the prophets and the apostles to do whatever we can to eradicate hunger from the face of your creation. We know that "We cannot do everything at once, but we can do something at once". We ask this for Jesus' sake, who gave everything to us so that we could give everything to others. Amen.

P.S. The Senior High Youth of Abiding Presence recently sponsored a Hunger "Banquet" on Wednesday, February 27 to draw our congregation's attention to not only the dreadful statistics of the world's hunger situation but also to provide information on how we can help. Hundreds of organizations (just Google on 'hunger") are combating this problem and slowly making headway, including ELCA who is prominent among them. If you want to find out what ELCA is doing, visit www.elca.org/hunger.

If you are looking to do something locally and immediately, APLC has a food pantry in the corner of the narthex that benefits Redeemer Lutheran Church in Trenton, NJ...and the Trenton Area Soup Kitchen (TASK) is only minutes away.

The Senior High Youth drew a poster called the Tree of Life that is currently hanging in the Fellowship Hall. If you feel driven to actively participate in the relief of world hunger in 2008, please sign this poster. Thanks be to God.

Contributed by Donald
Sunday March 9, 2008
Liturgical Year A Week 15
Sunday Gospel reading:
Second Sunday in Lent