[Jesus said], “Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world, for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, I was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’ Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry and gave you food or thirsty and gave you something to drink? And when was it that we saw you a stranger and welcomed you or naked and gave you clothing? And when was it that we saw you sick or in prison and visited you?’ And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me.’”

-Matthew 25:34-40

As I write this on Tuesday, a picture I posted on the RLC Facebook page Friday afternoon has been shared 49 times. The picture, included here, is a notice that our congregation’s monthly community meal will be moving to weekly for the month of November. 

Why the change? With SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program) benefits unfunded and the U.S. Federal Government shut down, and the decision not to access emergency funding for SNAP payments, this Saturday, November 1, no SNAP dollars will be distributed. It will be the first time in the history of the SNAP program that payments have not gone out on time, including during shutdowns under previous administrations. In Iowa, over 271,000 people receive SNAP benefits. Over 51,000 of those people live in Polk County, though sixteen other Iowa counties have higher rates of their populations receiving SNAP benefits. About ⅔ of people in Iowa receiving SNAP are children, disabled, or elderly. With a few exceptions, other adults receiving SNAP are working, but their wages are inadequate to lift them out of poverty. According to Food Bank of Iowa, SNAP provides 90% of food assistance in the state of Iowa; churches, community food banks, school food programs, and other sources account for only 10% of food assistance. Our community partners at the DMARC Food Pantry Network and the Ankeny Service Center are sounding the alarms that they cannot meet the need created by the absence of SNAP.

And when I heard the need, I thought: well, the only thing that can actually solve this crisis is getting SNAP funding restored. But I also remembered that solving a crisis is not the only thing that matters– but doing each thing we can for each person we can at each opportunity we get. Mother Teresa, the saint who dedicated her life to caring for the poor of Calcutta, India, said, “If you cannot feed a hundred people, feed one.” So when community members started offering to take our monthly meal and turn it into a weekly one, I could only say yes and work on coordinating the meals and getting the word out– leading to the aforementioned picture.

On Tuesday, somewhere around share number 42, I got a text. “Congrats, we’ve gone viral!” I laughed and replied that I’d seen other posts get shared more, in particular one that I made eight or nine years ago with a quote from a Christmas sermon preached by Martin Luther, “The inn was full… There are many of you who think to yourselves: ‘If only I had been there! How quick I would have been to help the baby!’ Why don’t you do it now? You have Christ in your neighbor. You ought to serve your neighbor, for what you do to your neighbor in need you do to the Lord Christ himself.” 

You see, when we Christians see our neighbors hungry, our responsibility is to see Jesus Christ in them and feed them. It’s not to ask whether they deserve our help, not to judge how they came to be in their predicament, not to scold them for their circumstances, not to feel overwhelmed by the scale of the problem. Just look at that person, see that any hungry human is made in God’s image and worthy of love, and do what you can to feed them.

What we can do, together with our connections in the community, is provide a free, hot meal every Wednesday in November. What we can do is see each hungry person as if we were looking right at Jesus Christ in need. What we can do is love our neighbor, as God commands us to do. We can let God’s generous love go viral through our actions.

To quote Mother Teresa once more: “Not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love.”