Do All Children Have to Ask?

“Do all children have to ask before they get?”

A segment on WBEZ’s “Morning Shift” radio program this week included a discussion of summer food insecurity in Chicago. Scattered among interviews with food distributors and community organizers and non-profit organizations were snatches of interviews with children who live with food insecurity every day—that is, those for whom summer days are hungry days.

It was late afternoon when the interviewer met the little boy I quoted above, asking what he had eaten that day.

“Just the bag of chips you just gave me.”

The interviewer probed, “You mean that’s all you’ve had since breakfast.”

“No, I don’t get breakfast unless I ask for it, and I don’t ask for it because there isn’t any.”  Pause. “Do all children have to ask before they get?”

In Sunday’s gospel reading, Jesus sends his disciples out with nothing but a walking stick: “No bread, no bag, no money in their belts; sandals and only the clothes they were wearing.” (Mark 6.1-13)  Like the Chicago school child who didn’t get fed unless he asked, the disciples were to rely completely on the kindness of strangers.  But the chasm between them is wide. It is one thing for a grown adult to set out on a mission that might involve occasional hunger. But to be a child for whom hunger is a daily forced march?

All of Sunday’s texts address the frustrations and inequities baked into our common life.

God called Ezekiel to speak to the people of Israel with this description: “They have rebelled against me; they sin against me to this very day; they are impudent and stubborn.” (Ezekiel 2.1-5) God had zero expectation that they would listen to Ezekiel, so God set the bar to success remarkably low. “At least they will know that there has been a prophet among them.”  If showing up is half the battle, Ezekiel knew his batting average was 50%.  And it would never improve, no matter how hard he swung for the fences.

We continue to read in Paul’s second letter to the church at Corinth, as Paul lets them in on a secret.  “A thorn was given to me in the flesh to keep me from being too elated.” (2 Corinthians 12.2-10)  Almost worse than Ezekiel’s thankless mission, Paul limped every step of his journey.  And he credited his halting gait to God.

“Do all children have to ask before they get?”

Meanwhile, we live with a near-embarrassment of riches. On Sunday morning we celebrate an abundance of children, as we welcome two little ones in baptism. Our worship space is clean and well-lit, cool on these hot days. There is always food to eat and love to share. Haunted by the words of a hungry child, I know that these things are gifts—we do not deserve them, and we do not have to ask for them. So how do we live?

As Jesus’ disciples, we are steadied by one another as his first disciples were steadied by their walking sticks. And, as Jesus’ disciples, we know that we might be the strangers on whom the world relies for kindness.

I invite you to bring a bag of groceries with you Sunday morning for our Northfield Township Food Pantry collection.  I ask you to make an extra donation to an agency that cares for children. I challenge you to be more attentive to legislation—local, state and national—that impacts the welfare of children. I encourage you to notice the sorrow around you and wonder about it rather than dismiss it.

“Do all children have to ask before they get?” Not if we can help it.

Limping along with you,

Pastor JoAnn Post