Collecting For Food Bank at ASDA.

I was collecting for Food Bank on behalf of Towcester Road Methodist Church recently- while the choir sang Christmas Carols (at ASDA). What a humbling experience (standing at the door, greeting shoppers and asking them to put something in the trolley).

Coming from a country where feeding the poor and standing up for the marginalized is something that you take for granted as a minister of the gospel – it was quite sobering to hear people say things like – “it is such a shame that things like this should happen in a country like Britain”, “unbelievable that you should be collecting food in a country like ours”.

I don’t know if I should say that poverty is relative – I am used to poverty that you can literally smell and that you can see blatantly in front of you. Some years ago I wrote this when visiting an elderly man in a township back home:

The silent, evil voice of poverty ,

shouts loudly in my ears ...

the bitter taste sticks to my skin,

and on my clothes and tastes on my lips ...

the acrid smell of it burns my nostrils ...

Oh, the poverty .

The tired voice of "cannot anymore"

"Had enough”, says to me:

"Umfundisi, now I just wait for the Big Train to come,

And for the great conductor to call

old Shorty 's name ...

Umfundisi, then I'll go... I'll go ... "

... So helpless, so helpless...

nothing I have or can give ...

nothing can bring lasting change ...

... what I have ... well ... just for now ...

is love and respect ...

At least it will give some dignity now...

just for now

Here it is a different story – you can’t see it like you see it our townships and informal settlements – but it is here, and it is growing.

I have always been certain that I am called to proclaim the values of the Reign of Jesus (hope, peace, joy, love, justice, equality ….) a calling that I can’t seem to get away from (even here, in one of the most prosperous countries in the world).

At the end of our Liturgical Year we usually celebrate Christ the King Sunday. This is perfectly appropriate for it reminds us of the purpose of our year-in and year-out living — putting Jesus first in all things. As the author of Colossians puts it: “Jesus is the image of the invisible God (Col 1:15-16 and 18). “The person who refuses to love doesn't know the first thing about God, because God is love—so you can’t know him if you don’t love.” (1 John 4: 7-8).

As our Liturgical Year ends and a New Liturgical year begun this month - May our default stance be for Jesus. What does it mean to be for Jesus? It means to be for what he was for. To be for: LOVE, truth, gentleness, forgiveness, generosity, compassion for the vulnerable, to live lives of prayer, peace, joy and justice etc. This stance for Jesus is the most faithful way we can prepare for his birth among us.

There is such intolerance everywhere around us today – and it is so easy to focus on that and to be drawn into it ourselves. More than ever before, we need to focus on Jesus and to live the values of the Reign of God – to be an alternative to that which we see around us.

I am thankful for the folk of Towcester Road Methodist Church, Northampton, for taking a stance for the values that Jesus represents. I am thankful for the opportunity I had to stand at the door of a shopping complex – making a statement that all is not well in our society – and for pointing people to the role of the church in a society that is not well – being the mouthpiece of the poor and the vulnerable.

Emmanuel – God is with us.