Hunger Strike

Spending last week in New Orleans brought back memories of my first trip there three years ago. LowCountry Community Church had sent a mission team to clean up homes damaged by Hurricane Katrina seven months earlier. The work was discouraging. We threw away waterlogged possessions and gutted houses to their bare framework. “Why even do this?” I was often tempted to wonder. The residents might rebuild, but another storm could come and ruin everything again.

I tried to keep in mind what a pastor had said on the first day of the trip. He had spoken to the work crews on Matthew 14:13-21, in which Jesus satisfied the hunger of 5,000 with just five loaves of bread and two fish. He pointed out that the Lord charged His disciples with doing the actual feeding. “Your job is to feed the people,” he told us repeatedly, emphasizing that we would need to encourage the homeowners, listen to their stories with compassion, and tell them of God’s love and care.

Indeed, we were helping give residents a new start of sorts. And by getting to know them, we showed them God cares and His people care. Later in the week, a team member was ripping out pieces of sheetrock in a bedroom when he uncovered two words, written in permanent marker on the inside wall: “Feed me,” it read. It was a powerful confirmation that our work was not in vain.