Early in this crisis, I noticed that while I couldn’t find dried beans or uncooked rice for love or money, the fresh produce remained, for the most part, at its usually stocked level. While it was encouraging to see so much evidence that people still know how to cook rice and beans from scratch, I knew that if that was all they were buying, they would be in a world of hurt in two weeks’ time.
It’s been two weeks now. When I had my vocal cord infection, I didn’t go shopping for the first two or three weeks. My husband still went out to buy staples, but I didn’t send him to buy produce because I’m very picky and personal about it. I don’t cook from recipes very often, but combine ingredients based on what’s in season and what nutrients my body is telling me I need. Because of this, I ate little more than rice and beans that entire time. Around the second week of this, my body was mad at me in ways I couldn’t quite identify. I wasn’t hungry—I was getting enough calories—but I could feel that something was missing. My mood was livable, but not great. I sent my husband to get me some kale, and I felt a little better. The following week, I finally got to see the doctor. As he was examining my vocal cords, he remarked, “Did you just change your diet? Are you having a hard time eating?” “No . . . why?” He explained to me that there’s this thing called thrush that grows in your mouth when you make sudden cuts to your diet. He managed to identify what I couldn’t: that I had gotten rid of foods that I actually need to function properly. Incidentally, the treatment for thrush isn’t fun; it involves gargling a nasty-tasting medicine three times a day for five minutes apiece. Thrush isn’t the worst thing ever, but it’s an important reminder of the value of eating a variety of nutrients from a variety of foods. Nutrition, as people who study hunger have figured out, isn’t just about getting the right number of calories, but about getting a good spectrum of micronutrients as well. Measuring out in rice exactly the right number of calories for your body won’t make your body happy, and it won’t help your appetite, either. The four food groups you learned in elementary school are a good start at grasping this concept, but an even better rule of thumb is to eat as many colors of food as possible as close as possible to how they appear in nature. In other words, multiple colors of jelly beans won’t help you (delicious though they may be), but multiple colors of fruits and vegetables will. Also, any one vegetable eaten at the exclusion of all others is unhealthy, even a vegetable as well-known for its micronutrients as, for example, kale. Rice and beans aren’t bad; they’re an excellent base to start from. You just need a few other things on top of that every once in a while. Tomatoes, onions, and peppers come to mind. I think that a big reason why people struggle with this is because they have not learned how to store and cook produce in the long haul. As a life-long vegetarian, I was perplexed early in this crisis when I saw the meat aisle empty, because I was under the impression that meat doesn’t keep. I later learned that people freeze it and cook it in small amounts. The exact same principle works for most fruits and vegetables quite magnificently. If you can cook it, you can probably freeze it to enjoy later. Nature offers an abundance of delicious, healthy foods, and it does the body good to explore them. With so many of us forced out of easy access to our most routinely-used ingredients, this is a great time to try some things that are a little more off the beaten track. The Internet makes it easier than ever to learn about unfamiliar ingredients, and the journey of learning how to use them can be really, really fun.
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The first two weeks of social distancing, one of my primary tasks was calling through a part of the church directory. The three most common questions I got were: “How long do you think this will last?” (I don’t know), “Can I mail in my tithe?” (please do!), and “How can I help?”. This last question is so common, it’s well worth taking a blog post to answer.
If you are healthy and not in one of the risk categories for coronavirus, there are two great opportunities. While many things have closed, the food banks remain open and in high demand. With that demand, they find themselves in desperate need of volunteers. The food bank I have a relationship with is Shepherd’s Pantry in Glendora, and they really need the help. I imagine that any food bank you can find would be delighted to have an influx of volunteers right now. Secondly, if you can, please donate blood. Because many blood drives have been cancelled, it has been difficult for organizations like the Red Cross and City of Hope to maintain a sufficient supply. The Red Cross has blood centers in Pomona and Pasadena, and appointments can be booked at redcrossblood.org. If you want to be able to donate more often than you can giving whole blood, consider donating platelets. The process takes longer—about two hours—but platelets can be given every two weeks, and they usually go to cancer patients. Even if you are not healthy or risk-free enough to do one of those two things, there are other things you can do to help. To prevent the spread of the virus without taking masks away from the medical setting, some authorities are starting to recommend home-made cloth masks. If you know how to sew and can find material, making and distributing these masks could be of great service. Patterns for home-made cloth masks can be found online. Note: if you wish to start wearing these masks, please wash them properly after each use without exposing anyone else to your germs. Another good thing almost anyone can do, if they have plenty of time on their hands, is to volunteer as a listener on 7cups.com. This site’s focus is to connect people with compassionate listeners they can reach out to when things are tough. Training is provided for the listeners, including when it is necessary to refer the issue to professional therapists. Best of all, the “listening” is done via text, so you don’t even have to get out of your pajamas to help. Because I was answering my church members in these phone calls, I’ll talk about the church’s needs, too. In terms of volunteer man-hours, we just don’t need as much as we normally do, and what volunteering we do need during this season is very different than what we need during ordinary time. Right now, the crucial thing is keeping the community together through communication, which mostly means lots of time on Zoom and Facebook Live with all ages. However, if that’s not your thing, picking up the phone and calling your friends from church helps. A lot. People need the connections of church community now more than ever. I have spoken of prayer before, and that will always be helpful, whether on your own or with other people. You can find my church praying on Facebook Live at 5 pm every day for the next few months. My LEAST favorite thing to talk about as a pastor is tithe and offering. Few things anger me like tone-deaf appeals for funds from people who can’t actually afford to give the sums asked, especially when the appeal is emotionally manipulative or spiritually abusive. I know how hard you all work, and am also well aware that a number of you have lost some or even all of your income because of this thing. If you can give, though, we could really use the help in the form of both tithes and offerings. If you didn’t know about the distinction between tithes and offerings, let me briefly explain: Biblically, tithe is 10% of one’s “increase” (define that in whatever way makes sense to you) and earmarked specifically for the salaries of clergy. In the Adventist system, your tithe goes to the conference office, where it is carefully and watchfully used to employ the pastors at a living wage—pastors from large churches make no more or less than pastors from small churches. In ordinary time, my church brings in enough tithe to support three and a half pastors, but takes care of its needs with two, which allows better coverage in the smaller churches. In other words, my church’s tithe doesn’t just affect my senior pastor and myself, but my colleagues working in smaller contexts as well. Offerings, which are in addition to tithe at whatever amount the giver is willing and able to give, are for all the other expenses of running the church. Normally, when I make appeals about this, I tend to mention the expenses of the building and of the various ministries, including subsidy to our Adventist school, which definitely needs the help. Right now, though, I would like to draw attention to the fact that my local church has actual employees, like our wonderful secretary, who are paid out of these offerings. I am incredibly fond of these employees, and would very much like to see them continue to be able to eat, never mind the fact that their work is crucial to keeping the church running. For their sake, if you can give, please give. As much as I hate calling for tithes and offerings, they are necessary to keep anything resembling organized religion functional in the months and years ahead. While I genuinely believe that faith can flourish even when the structures are gone, the structures make it much easier and more effective—not to mention more familiar and comforting. Even if the only sums you can spare are small, together they make a difference, and every cent is deeply appreciated. The question “How can I help?” touches me every time I hear it, because it means that someone is thinking about more than themselves during these trying times. It reflects a selfless attitude that is refreshing to see in a time of panic-buying. As Craig Cerro, director of Shepherd’s Pantry, said to me early in this crisis, “In times like these, some people immediately think of others and want to help, and some panic. You never know who will do what until it happens.” Thank you for being the kind of person who thinks of others. |
AuthorJillian Lutes is the youth pastor at West Covina Hills Seventh-day Adventist Church. Archives
May 2020
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