Phil Jarrell, of the Department of Agriculture (as well as the Manassas Church of Christ), informed me that we definitely do NOT spend as much on pet food as the third world does on people food.  He’s surely right, yet there are so many ways to fiddle with the math that the writer I mentioned above may truly believe he is right too.  But what if we added the cash we spend on caffeine delivery systems to that pet food bill?  Or the money exchanged for CDs?  Or X-box games where we get our kicks from committing virtual murder and mayhem?  How much would that add up to in full bellies?  The world we inhabit is the only world we know, so naturally, we rarely think of the third world poor as being in our world at all.  We don’t really know about them, so none of these questions naturally occur to us.

            There is a touching, infuriating scene in Pietro DiDonato’s masterpiece Christ in Concrete, where a young boy,  whose father has been killed in a skyscraper project, must go to the parish priest to ask for some food.  His mother is ill, his brothers and sisters small, and there are only a few potatoes left in the tenement room they share.  It is the Depression, and countless families in New York are in need, so the priest rehearses, for the hundredth time that day no doubt, what the proper aid channels are.  Through the open door, the boy can see the priest’s dinner table, and wishes he could take just one of those heaping dishes home to his family.  In a gesture the priest certainly considered thoughtful on his part, he sends a slice of cake home with the boy.  One slice of cake.  It takes substantially less than the opulence of Louis XVI’s court to turn a normal person into Marie-Antoinette.            Of course there are other blessing we enjoy in inappreciative oblivion, while the rest of the world waits in hunger – personal freedom, access to education, access to health care, tranquility, stability, and the most precious of all – ready fellowship with a family of faith.  Of course one does not have to look to Africa, Asia, or Latin America to find the needy.  Usually they are within walking distance of our front doors.

            Jesus clearly states in Matthew 25 that we will be judged by our response to those in need.  He further communicates that those who are condemned for NOT helping are surprised to know they ever had the opportunity.  In the past weeks we have been clearly reminded of our opportunity, here at the Manassas Church of Christ.  The elders have informed us that we have a benevolence crisis – that immediate needs here are more than our present budget can ever meet.  Let me take this opportunity to challenge a loving and generous congregation to “not be weary in well-doing” (II Thessalonians 3.13), to excel even more at the love we so readily express, and give what we can to meet the challenge the elders have shared.

            Now as to the love of the Brethren , you have no need for anyone to write you, for you, yourselves are taught by God to love one another….but we urge you to excel more.   - Thessalonians 4.9