Elkton Community Kitchen
Hungry Souls
by Carl Mazza
Then Jesus said to his host, "When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous."
- Luke 14:12-14

When I walk into the Elkton Community Kitchen on Friday afternoons, I immediately become conscious of feelings which I can only describe as soul-full. It is not like a usual soup kitchen or charitable station. Rather, newcomers are surprised that there is no serving line or pick-up point. Instead, the large fellowship hall at Elkton Presbyterian Church is organized as a buffet with several stations. Persons serve themselves casually from tables in different parts of the room - some with soup and hot dishes or salads, others with desserts, sandwiches, and drinks. Everyone chooses a place, and all eat together, including those who have come especially as preparers.

Sometimes persons come just to eat, but stay to volunteer with serving or cleanup. Casual visitors have joined the organizing committee and soon sign up for their own week. Many of the weekly hosts are volunteer groups from churches, but other community groups as well including a sorority, the local Department of Social Services, and groups of homeless and formerly homeless persons.

Some amazing things have taken place since we opened last April. One has been the "take-out" phenomenon. Since the serving is so open and informal, many quiet souls pack an extra lunch and take it with them. For some, it is their dinner. But most are taken right away to others in the community who cannot come to the lunch - some are working, others shut-in or disabled.

It is a particularly moving sight to see persons walking out of the Kitchen with a carefully packed lunch, down the street to bring it personally to someone who needs it. It is so much more than food for someone's stomach, it is also the meat of human evangelism - spreading good news. Much righteousness is released among all when there is the opportunity of generosity and simple kindness.
So many times our impulse is to serve others. We are blessed by knowing that we have really helped someone and made a difference to them. Most of us, including homeless folk, would rather be such helpers, as opposed to persons on the receiving end of charity. What if we, rather than offering so much direct aid, could seek to organize contexts or platforms so persons could then help themselves and others, perhaps in unique ways?

Most times, I think, we are reluctant to admit the hunger of our own souls. To express our own neediness and emptiness makes us vulnerable, and far too open to disappointment and pain. For this reason our sincere service to others is very important to us because we know that it secretly nourishes our own souls, which yearn for this selfless giving and compassionate work. It is part of a very essence of that which carries such beauty to be human.

Yet, how much more satisfying if our good work were more than just to meet basic and immediate needs. What if the care we express were that which actually helps to liberate others? Suppose you and I, in our giving, were to give others the gift of their own freedom? Such a powerful offering cannot be made merely as a sandwich or a bowl of soup. Yet a meal is very important because it is a context, an opportunity.

At the Kitchen, amid the noise of pots and pans, utensils, and dishwater - there is laughter, gentle kidding, friendly banter, and sometimes, by the grace of God, an awesome life-changing bit of conversation. Who may know what dreams and potential may be released in new-found friendship and smile of a one time stranger, now become friend, across two plates of food at a lunch table?

Perhaps these small things are part of the larger reason Jesus compared the grand work of the liberation of human souls by God almighty to the familiar event of a meal. Yet, not just any meal. It is a gathering at which the stranger is no longer alone, the poor person is no longer destitute, the rich person no longer anxious.

At the table all sit together, eating and drinking, as it were, of the very same food. After so much hard work of preparing and serving food for others, as we push slowly away from the table and ask permission to take our leave, we take the satisfaction of a soul fed full. And we make a parting gesture of the deepest of all gratitude to the master of that feast which has so filled our hearts.