If there is among you a poor man, one of your brethren, in any of your towns within your land which the Lord your God gives you, you shall not harden your heart or shut your hand against your poor brother, but you shall open your hand to him, and lend him sufficient for his need, whatever it may be. Take heed lest there be a base thought in your heart, and you say, ‘The seventh year, the year of release is near,’ and your eye be hostile to your poor brother, and you give him nothing, and he cry to the Lord against you, and it be sin in you. You shall give to him freely, and your heart shall not be grudging when you give to him; because for this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in all that you undertake. For the poor will never cease out of the land; therefore I command you, You shall open wide your hand to your brother, to the needy and to the poor, in the land.
The poor are always with us.
Jesus Himself acknowledged this ancient truth. No matter how hard people might work to eliminate poverty, there will always be those among us who fall on hard times, who struggle just to get by day to day.
Even those who are ultimately successful in life occasionally struggle. I know this to be true, because I have lived that struggle more than once. I know what it is to be poor in body and in spirit. Neither circumstance is at all pleasant.
From the very beginning, we have been called to have mercy on the poor, and compassion to those less fortunate than we. The prophet Isaiah reminds us that we are called help feed those around us who are hungry. There is no question but that this is a sacred duty upon us all.
This calling deserves our particular attention at the moment, with the US Government’s Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in turmoil, and recipients facing a November of partial and likely delayed benefits. The seemingly endless government shutdown has thrown funding for the program into the hazard, and although the courts are commanding the government utilize emergency funds to pay out at least some benefits, what becomes of food assistance in December remains a question.
If the shutdown drags on that long, there will be no more emergency funds. If the shutdown drags on that long, there may be no more SNAP benefits.
Nor can we overlook the tens of thousands of government employees whose wages are currently in limbo, not because they were laid off or otherwise separated, but because the Congress cannot pass legislation necessary to provide the funds to pay their wages. Paychecks are held hostage to the endless squabbles between Democrats and Republicans in Congress.
Court orders or no court orders, our nation’s politics are disrupting people’s ability to feed themselves and their families.
Putting aside momentarily the question of how many workers our government genuinely needs, the reality of the moment is that, like all employers, the government has made a pledge to pay its employees for their labors. There is no question but that the workman is worth his wages—that is made plain in Leviticus 19—and when wages have been pledged there is an obligation to pay. The government shutdown is disrupting its ability to honor that pledge.
Putting aside momentarily the question of whether SNAP is a wise use of the public fisc, the reality of the moment is the US government has made a pledge to provide food assistance to 42 million individuals, fulfilling a duty to which God calls us all. The government shutdown is disrupting its ability to honor that pledge.
That should disturb us. It offends the conscience—not to mention God’s Law—that political squabbles in Congress should impact whether someone is able to eat or not.
God’s Law is clear, and has been for millennia. We are called to feed the hungry. Our government will not answer this call on our behalf this month, at least not fully.
That is disturbing.
Yet we should be disturbed even more by the state of many of our nation’s food pantries and food banks. Even as the disruption of SNAP has captured headlines, a stark subtext has emerged: food banks, food pantries, and other charities focused on helping ward off hunger and food insecurity struggle to meet the needs of the hungry in many communities.
People can debate in good conscience why there is a growing need for the charitable work of food banks and pantries, as well as the best way we as a people should respond to that need. Alongside that debate, however, the current reality cannot be denied. Our nation's poor and needy are outpacing our generosity.
Again, God’s Law is clear, and has been for millennia. We are called to feed the hungry. Not only is our government is failing to answer the call for us this month, but we ourselves are failing to answer the call directly.
We do well to remember the judgement upon the nations given in Matthew 25, in the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats. The mercies we show the stranger, the sick, the weak, and the vulnerable are gifts given directly to God. The mercies we withhold are likewise gifts withheld from God.
Surely we do not wish to number among the goats, among those who foolishly withhold their gifts from God by being hard-hearted towards the weak, the poor, and the hungry?
The easy and immediate remedy is that people give more support to food charities in their communities—and I urge everyone to do exactly that. Now especially, giving what you can to help those in need is a generosity that will make a difference.
Yet the disruption of government-provided food assistance also stands as a pointed reminder that God’s Law directs each of us to be compassionate towards the poor and merciful to the hungry. In both the Old and New Testament, the call to aid the poor is not laid at the feet of governors or kings, but at the feet of all people.
With SNAP having been reduced to a political football over funding, it is clear there is a particular wisdom in putting this charge on people and not on governments. Governments are not kind. Governments are not compassionate. Governments are not merciful.
Governments operate by gathering and then wielding power, and there are few levers of power more potent then the power to decide who gets fed and when.
Not only are we failing to fully answer the call to feed our nation’s poor and hungry, we have been guilty of a major error in allowing government to answer the call in our stead. That we have government programs such as SNAP should be a source of shame for us, not pride. We should not consider it well done that we have delegated any part of God’s calling to unkind, dispassionate, merciless government.
There is but one way to prevent programs such as SNAP from being reduced to political footballs, and that is to take these programs out of politics. That means taking these programs out of government.
No matter how well-intentioned such programs might have been at the outset, it is painfully obvious particularly now that government has not handled these programs well. We as a people have entrusted government to answer God’s call to us for charity and mercy to the poor, and government has let us down.
As the calling to aid the poor is given not to governors and kings and Presidents, but to people, the failure of government to measure up to that calling is likewise not upon governors and kings and Presidents, but upon people. The failure of government to measure up to that calling is on us.
If we take away any insight from this sordid episode of government failure and government callousness, it should be this: we cannot outsource our generosity and our compassion to government, and it has been a tremendous mistake that we ever tried. As a people we sought to offload caring for the poor in our communities to government, and as a people we have watched government fail to deliver that care. As we have watched government fail, as a people we own that failure.
We have watched government programs intended to help the poor become entangled in politics, in corruption, in bureaucratic indifference. That we have allowed these things to happen means we have failed in our duty to show kindness and compassion to the poor.
We can do better. We must do better. We are called to do better.
God’s Law is clear, and has been for millennia. We are called to feed the hungry.
We are called to work with others in our communities to help those in need. We are called to acknowledge SNAP and similar programs for what they are—well-meaning but ultimately bad ideas that have failed us utterly. We are called to take back our sacred calling of aiding the poor and feeding the hungry. We are called to do ourselves what God has called us repeatedly to do ourselves.
In the First Book of Samuel, God warned the people of Israel all the ways having a king—having earthly government—would end badly for them. The rest of the Old Testament is an extended testimony on all the ways that prophecy came true for the people of Israel.
That warning should resonate even now for all people of all nations. Governments do not make a people more virtuous, more compassionate, more successful in fulfilling God’s Law. Rather, governments make a people less virtuous, less compassionate, and less likely to even attempt to fulfill God’s Law.
Government certainly has not helped us answer God’s call to feed the hungry.
The lesson of this sordid episode of SNAP funding disruption is that government is not merely the problem, government is the sin. Government is our sin.
My prayer in this moment is that we all will see the true failure of SNAP, and see that it is our failure. My prayer in this moment is that we will open our hearts and our hands to help those in need with genuine caring, genuine compassion. My prayer in this moment is that we all will look past the immediate funding failures of SNAP to the larger sin of delegating our compassion to government, and work to bring that sin to a long overdue end.
Governments do not make a people more virtuous, more compassionate, more successful in fulfilling God’s Law. Rather, governments make a people less virtuous, less compassionate, and less likely to even attempt to fulfill God’s Law.
Government certainly has not helped us answer God’s call to feed the hungry.
The lesson of this sordid episode of SNAP funding disruption is that government is not merely the problem, government is the sin. Government is our sin.
Extremely well-said, Peter, and 100% true.
And this is why it’s so important to have a society full of caring, compassionate individuals. We should all be giving from the heart. Each one of us needs to be caring, in order to have a caring civilization. Socialism takes by force, and the redistribution of wealth happens with resentment, corruption, and uncaring. Government is the problem, not the solution. Charity from the heart is the solution.
But here we enter into the problem area: individuals tend to be more than a bit selfish. They care about their own wellbeing, and that of their family members, more than they care about the wellbeing of strangers. Will that ever change? The only route I see is if they embrace the teachings of Jesus and love thy neighbor as you love yourself. Unfortunately, society has not been moving in that direction. I hope that the younger generations will find the solution that Jesus offers.