Love People And Feed Them

Sometime in the mid-eighties (I think ...) I trained as an evangelist for what may have been the last of the great 'crusades' in the UK, led by Luis Palau. I remember hundreds of people spilling out onto the pitch at Queen's Park Rangers football club in response to the call to give themselves to Jesus. It was pretty impressive, and I have nothing but admiration for the organisation and the good intentions and I hope, sincerely, that those who were saved stayed that way.

 

So I am peeling potatoes this morning at the Salvation Army and I am in fine form. We, pensioners all, (that is, over-sixty) are laughing out loud at the report in the press of a Cabinet meeting of the last government where Owen Patterson, keen to limit immigration and yet keep cheap labour for fruit farmers, suggested that we, the pensioners, be put out in the fields to pick the fruit instead. Oh! Because we shouldn't Idly collect state benefits and be a burden, and furthermore, we should be exempt from minimum wage legislation.

 

Apparently, one official present forgot protocol, and laughed out loud. Be that as it may, this crazy idea hasn't taken off - yet.

 

Turns out we ALL worked in the fields in our youth. Hoeing peas, planting potatoes, picking blackcurrants ... We speculated on ways that the various jobs we did could be adapted to our current afflictions: orchards adapted for mobility scooters being favourite.

 

Seems a long way from Queen's Park Rangers, this mission. Laughter, companionship and service brought together to prepare a meal for people like us who have fallen on hard times. In my thirties I thought it was necessary to fervently entreat others to go to Jesus for salvation. In my sixties I have finally grasped that 'Jesus' is already there. There is no 'them' and 'us' we are all life itself coming into incarnation.

 

To be an God-bearer is to love people and feed them. That's about it.

Meryl and Lee:

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