Editorial: Honor your mother; feed the hungry

Mother’s Day—May 11 this year—is only about a month away. So, now is the time to prepare to honor our mothers by collecting funds for the Texas Baptist Hunger Offering on their day.

Texas Baptists have gathered an offering to fight hunger and hunger-inducing poverty for years. A while back, we started collecting the offering every time a month had five Sundays.

And last year, we added Mother’s Day as the focal point for cooperating to feed and support people all over the world who fit Jesus’ description of “the least.” They’re the least nourished, the least clothed, the least educated, the least free, the least fortunate. And Jesus said we indicate our love for him by our actions for them.

The perfect time

Editor Marv KnoxIf you think about it, Mother’s Day is the perfect time to collect an offering to reduce hunger. When the vast, vast majority of us were tiny and helpless, our mothers accepted the primary responsibility to make sure we received life-sustaining food. Unfortunately, mothers all over the world do not have the means to provide sufficient nourishment for their children. We honor our mothers when we help other mothers feed their children.

The Texas Baptist Hunger Offering aids young mothers like Isabelle, a refugee of civil war in the Central African Republic. Our offering helped African Baptists provide rice that saved her life. When she asked them why they helped her, they explained Jesus is the Bread of Life, and people who follow Jesus worked together to feed her as an expression of Jesus’ love for her. Soon, she accepted Jesus as her Savior, too.

Stories like Isabelle’s can be told all over the globe, thanks to the Texas Baptist Hunger Offering.

Helps 140 ministries

This year, the offering targets more than 140 ministries across our state, throughout the nation and around the world. Some of those ministries provide food directly to hungry people. Many others help people, so they can feed themselves. Each one makes a difference in hurting lives.

You cannot pass responsibility for the Texas Baptist Hunger Offering along to others. It’s good news and bad news and good news again.

Good news: Every cent you give to the offering goes to support hunger-relief and anti-poverty ministries.

Bad news: If you hold back, those ministries will not receive all the support they need, and people will go hungry.

Good news: Giving is easy and direct.

Here’s how:

• Contribute online at www.texasbaptists.org/hungeroffering

• Write a check payable to your church and designated “Texas Baptist Hunger Offering.”

• Mail a check payable to “Texas Baptist Hunger Offering” to Christian Life Commission/BGCT, 333 N. Washington, Dallas, TX 75246.

You can multiply your contribution by encouraging your church to participate in the Texas Baptist Hunger Offering. The only way we can raise $1 million on Mother’s Day is if our churches participate. But even if your church does not participate, please give directly.

Your mother will be honored.