Wander Bread

About 6 months ago or so I picked up a new hobby that I enjoy.  I started going to auctions.  I had been to auctions before, but I actually decided to go to a storage auction.  I have since enjoyed going to an occasional auction.  The feeling is electric as you go to an auction.  What mystery is behind the door?  Or at a more normal auction, who wants what and what are they will to spend for it?  

It is so mysterious and fun.

That is until recently.

Recently, with the popularity of the storage auction television show, when you show up to an auction you will see approximately five times the amount of people there to bid.  The units sell for about five times the amount too.  People travel from all over to come and take part in the mystery in the hopes of getting a unit and making some money.

For example, last week people traveled from two hours away…

…for one unit…

…one unit.

Upon listening to their story, I find that they do this not so much for the fun that I enjoy the auctions for, but out of desperation.  

You see, there are some people who do this for a living, or to pay the bills their job can’t take care of.  They have become reliant on that income.  Now, there are hundreds of people buying units they used to get and the units they can get have the prices driven up and so they get less revenue. 

So it hit me, what I was seeing, this increased population in my area of those that are not “indigenous” to my area.

This was a lot like animal migration due to lack of food.

The predators, the veterans of auctions, have had to migrate to new hunting grounds.  New predators have come in and thinned out the prey.  For example, a lion may move to a different geographic location if a larger lion or other predator comes into his area and thins out the food supply. 

So where there is no food, animals leave.  Where there is no profit, people leave.

This is where my mind went to explore this from a spiritual perspective.

Jesus called Himself the Bread of Life (John 6), and He tells how this Bread sustains and those who eat of this bread will never go hungry.  Those who believe in the teaching of Christ would agree readily to this, that is, those who have experienced God through the work of Christ would.  There are certainly those that call themselves Christians that have never really experienced Christ, and therefore have never tasted of the proverbial bread.

Without getting off track, the basic idea is that those who experience Christ have their spiritual hunger met and have no need to look elsewhere.  They don’t need to migrate to be fed.  They don’t ever have to leave the land that they are indigenous to.  It isn’t that they just don’t leave; it is that they don’t want to.  

This isn’t a guilt trip about anyone leaving a church…please don’t take it that way because if you do…then the point has been missed.

Here is the point…The world is obviously starving spiritually.  Why?

Where are we?

We are called to be a type of bread vendor, and this is a generalization because there are certainly effective “vendors”, but in a culture where churches are often within a stone’s throw of each other… 

…why does it seem like there is so little bread?

Why would people rather migrate away from the “vendors?”

I am teetering on the verge of rambling, so I will wrap this up.

I will admit to you, I don’t have an answer as to how we go about fixing this, but I am searching.  It may be as simple as inviting your neighbors over for dinner…without an agenda of getting them “saved”, but rather just to get to know them. 

Just get to know them.

Love God, love them.