There I sat frustrated the other night flushing my kids’ left over dinner down the garbage disposal in the sink. If you’re a parent you’ve been there before and you’ll be there again. You spend lots of time doing food preparation for your children and then they don’t end up eating it. From an adult perspective it can be very aggravating! This is because we understand the cost of food and have an actual concept of waste. We also have an even larger perspective on world hunger and its realities. How many of your parents used the whole “there are starving children in Africa” line? I’m betting quite a few of us heard that. Let’s leave this food episode here for a second, though, and visit another common occurrence.

You’re in the drive-through getting your “fast fat” at McDonald’s or whatever the place may be that tickles your taste buds (there are only a g-gillion choices) and you get frustrated because your fast food isn’t quite fast enough. Who hasn’t exited their right minds momentarily and been frustrated by this? You’re lying if you say it’s never happened. But here’s the perspective, peeps! We “get to” go through a drive-through in a car that we own (also a luxury in many nations) and use money that we have or don’t have (enter credit card) to purchase whatever we want. Due to our hyper-speed culture these momentary lapses in perspective happen, but hopefully we arrive at this stark reality. We have access to so much food and we have a surplus of it in the United States. This fact contributes to all sorts of things that I won’t touch on in this post as I’m trying to stay on topic. In that vein, here’s one more example of a food problem.

I’m at a potluck last night with 30 or so people and there’s a ton of food there that people have brought to share and consume. Obviously there’s nothing wrong with a potluck or with sharing food. But the reality, once again, is that I’m in a normal, social setting where there is an absolute abundance of food. So, why am I ranting so much about this? I only want to say this very simple thing. Don’t miss this. Here’s your “food” for thought.

The next time we have leftover food from our meal or we get to go through the drive through or eat at our favorite restaurant, let’s do two things. Keep in mind that I speak to you not as an expert but as a learner (I preach to myself). 1) Let’s be thankful to God for all that we have. An attitude of thankfulness is one that quickly spills into generosity. 2) Let’s consider how we can help with the hunger problem in our city, our state, our nation and our world. It’s everywhere, folks, and it’s not going away. So, there’s a challenge to me and a challenge to you as we head into Halloween weekend. I’d love to hear any creative ideas you might have 0n this very important topic. Talk to you soon.

You are beautiful and you are loved and you matter….drew 🙂

Follow @drewmanity on Twitter!
Find music at: www.drewrieder.com