Hungering for the God Who Became BreadSampl

Day 4: The Feeding

Daily Bread

Ruth 2:11–18

Matthew 6:25–34

John 21:12–17

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When my soul was starving and I needed to be fed, my husband and I moved to Korea to start over. There I learned to eat again, around many tables with new friends. In Korea, food was participation; it was ministry. And I was filled.

But then Mum got sick.

So I went home and I fed Mum. I tucked a napkin into the top of her shirt, one of the cloth napkins she’d sewn. I fed her pea soup, her favorite brand, and we watched the birds outside her window. The birds dipped carelessly toward the glass and the feeder, knowing they would find seeds there, trusting the hand of my father to feed them.

And even as Mum smiled at me and opened her mouth for another bite, I thought how we weren’t so different from the birds: how careless we could be, dipping and gliding through life as we depended on our Father to feed us.

Mum got better for a while, and I began to feed mothers in Africa. They were stunning mothers with starving children, and the more the mothers came, the more I trusted our Father to feed us. And I saw miracles. I saw food appear where food hadn’t been before.

And then Mum flew away to heaven like the bird she was, and in the midst of the grief, God called me back to South Asia, to the mothers there. Pregnant mothers in Sri Lanka who were so hungry their babies were being born without parts. So we trusted our Father again and began to equip them with sustainable projects. And when I went to visit them, these mothers fed me. They spread feast after feast before me.

In one home, after one such feast, the mother began to talk about Jesus. She talked about Him like He was food, saying, “There’s a tree here whose leaves are sweet. But Jesus is sweeter. He is so sweet to the taste. I keep opening my mouth wider and wider to taste more and more of Him.”

My spirit watered. I wanted to taste Jesus too. She made me hungry for Him all over again. She, the fed, had become the feeder.

And this is why we can glide and dip so carelessly. Because our Father is careful with us, not wanting anyone to perish. We can sit at His table and feast on His Son and then spread our wings and feed others. That His glory might cover the earth.

Table Talk

Are you feeding someone right now? Maybe it’s your child, maybe it’s a neighbor. Whoever it is, you are entering into the great work of the Father who feeds the birds. Feeding can become dreary, weary work, and it’s tempting to start thinking we’re the responsible ones. But really, we’re just birds, too, finding seed and bringing it to other birds. Our Father is the great Birdkeeper. May He cause your spirit to water today, friend. May He fill you afresh so you might keep overflowing. May He meet you amid the dreary and the weary and remind you He is never-ending, and His strength is for you.

Prayer

Feeder of the Birds, we thank You for all the seed—for all the many ways You provide for us—and we cry out, “Please keep feeding us, that we might feed others.” Give us eyes to see the ones who hunger. Give us ears to hear their cries. Give us hearts willing to span the earth in search of them. For You will provide for Your children. May all stomachs be filled today, may all spirits be watered today, O Lord, for Your glory, that none should perish but everyone have everlasting life. In Your Son’s name, amen.