Christians obliged to feed the hungry

Every community has people who do not have the food needed to meet their needs. Most all of us agree that the hungry must be fed. I learned this lesson early in life.

I was a child of the Great Depression. It is difficult for the present generation to understand how desperate people were. I lived in a small town in the Mid-West. The TP&W Railroad ran through our town. I lived less than a block from the tracks. The TP&W was an east-west freight bypass of Chicago. It carried no passengers, except the desperate men (we called them “bums”) who rode the rails trying to get from east to west to start a new life. They were ingenious in the places they would create to ride the freight cars on their desperate journey. The typical bum had no money and no clothes other than what he was wearing.

As the freight trains passed through Fairbury, they would slow down. The bums would jump off the freight trains to care for their needs. They started with a trek to the back doors of nearby homes, asking for food. My mother never turned a bum away. A typical gift was a sandwich of peanut butter and jelly or possibly bologna. If she had a piece of fruit she would include that in her gift. Bums were always polite and thankful.

Once our sojourner had found food and addressed other personal needs, he made his way back to the tracks and waited for the next train to pass through. Kansas City, Santa Fe, Los Angeles.

My mother knew the demands of her Christian Faith. She had an obligation to feed the sojourner.

The John gospel is an interesting look at the face of Christianity in the bustling city of Ephesus 70 to 90 years after the death of Jesus. Ephesus was a mixture of cultural, economic and religious diversity. The John writer was eager to convince every person that the Jesus Faith was the true one that stood far above all others. The John writer was convinced that if the citizens of Ephesus heard of the works of Jesus that they would follow him in faith. He wrote a fictional version of the life of Jesus. It is highlighted with long verbatim of Jesus speeches and prayers. The John writer adds stories that set out the “signs” of the Jesus gospel.

The fourth sign is most memorable. A crowd of five thousand Galilean peasants followed him and would not leave. How were they to be fed? One of the Jesus’ disciples found a boy with five fish and two loaves of bread. Jesus blessed the fish and loaves, fed the 5,000 and had several baskets of bread left over. The story is reminiscent of the story of God feeding the Israelites wandering in the dessert with manna from heaven.

The John gospel can be critiqued literarily and historically, and the stories are not easy to believe, BUT there are messages that ring true to the life that was lived by Jesus, the peasant teacher from Galilee. The messages are unavoidable for people who want to identify themselves with Jesus from Nazareth.

Ephesus was a city in southwest Asia Minor. It was on the highway that led people from all over the Middle East to Rome. Just like Fairbury, there was a seemingly endless stream of people who passed through Ephesus. Apparently Paul spent three years in Ephesus. He was aggressive in his spread of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and Ephesus was a critical place. There is a tradition that says John, the disciple of Jesus, took Mary, the mother of Jesus, and moved to Ephesus. According to the tradition, they lived out their lives in that busy city. In the spread of Christianity, Ephesus became an important center of Christian activity. The John gospel was written there and spread from there. The three John letters were written there. The book of Revelation came from that area.

While the John gospel contains a lot of theology, there is a strong message about the behavior of Christians. I find that the John gospel is a gracious and caring document. My own reading of the John gospel leads me to believe that helping the sick, giving hospitality to the sojourner, and feeding the hungry are to be the public identity of Christians. The story of Jesus feeding the hungry is an essential part of the Christian message.

With some justification I am proud of the Christians in my own area who operate food pantries. Our food pantries vigorously gather surplus food from grocery stores, restaurants, farmers and individuals. The food needs of thousands of people are met every day by these church based ministries. I personally have many friends who are dependent upon these church based pantries.

Churches are imperfect institutions. They should never escape critical scrutiny and evaluation. They should also be commended when they do things right. The food pantries of which I am aware have few employees and many volunteers. They do what they do with religious motivation.

According to John, Jesus fed 5,000 people with five fish and two loaves of bread and had baskets of food left over. Food baskets should be our truest logo, and food for the sojourner should be one of our most important hallmarks.

The Rev. Howard Bess is a retired American Baptist minister, who lives in Palmer. His email address is hdbss@mtaonline.net.