Growling lion
It's 1:15 on a Wednesday afternoon and my stomach is growling because I've yet to have lunch.  It's important to note I've had precisely 2.5 cups of coffee and two butter-lavished blueberry muffins, and yet I'm still hungry.  My pantry and refrigerator are full, so at any moment I can shut the lion's mouth.

If they felt like I do right now, my children would dramatically insist they "are starving!"  Ever since I read Lois Lowery's "The Giver" a few years ago–where children were required to use precise language (i.e., I'm hungry is the accurate version of I'm starving)–I've corrected them when they use that line, reminding them they most certainly are NOT starving and more likely, they're bored. 

S i g h…the luxury of "boredom eating"….

Ever since I discovered the Advent Conspiracy, I've been haunted by a single statistic:  Americans spend about $450 BILLION on Christmas every year; then to learn it would cost an estimated $10 billion to make available clean water to the world's population?  It compels me to:

  • earnestly pray for those in need
  • consider how I might sacrifice something…anything…in order to make a contribution.

This week I've encountered a new haunting:  the reminder that tummies all over the globe have growled themselves to sleep. 

Today is Global Food Crisis Day.  Lots of bloggers are writing about it, and new-to-me statistics begin to break my heart:

  • A child dies every seven seconds from hunger-related causes
  • Worldwide, 161 million preschool children suffer from chronic malnutrition
  • One person in seven goes to bed hungry every night.

Why is this happening?  The Compassion site explains:  "The cost of food staples have roughly doubled in many countries where
Compassion serves. Some of the original factors that turned this trend
into a world calamity recently include unstable oil prices, increased
meat consumption in countries like India and China, droughts in major
crop-producing countries, and increased production of biofuels.

You can do something to help…a few things, as a matter of fact.  Please–

  1. Visit to learn more about the Global Food Crisis.
  2. Donate to Compassion's Global Food Crisis Fund.
  3. If you have a blog or website, add a Global Food Crisis widget to your sidebar or in a post:
  4. If you can't "do something" today, plan to contribute next week or even next month. 
  5. Pray…pray for them, pray for how you can become a part of their solution, pray for wisdom as Compassion and like organizations collectively act to provide remedy and relief. 

Thank you.  Eight letters which convey the weight of 8,000. 


Photo credit: day.htm

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