photo #8728996

A LOVE LETTER TO EBT I saw your boyfriend yesterday outside Dollar General. Red face. Swollen hands. Talking to the parking meter about Vietnam. He wasn't in Vietnam. He's thirty-four. Smelled like piss and Mad Dog 20/20 and giving up. He tried to buy cigarettes with your card. Cashier said no. He called her something I won't write here. You bought his Mountain Dew and Funyuns though. Love. I saw another one at the Laundromat. Dancing. Not dancing. Twitching. Meth choreography. Her kids in the parking lot. Six and eight. Eating gas station doughnuts on the curb. Watching their mom audition for a demon. You fed those kids breakfast. Love. Then there's the one that breaks my heart. Twenty-three. Three kids in diapers. Different dads. Boyfriend's in the apartment. Call of Duty. Sixth hour. Monster Energy and pizza rolls and an airbrushed plastic woman on Pornhub in the next tab. She's at Walmart. Baby on hip. Two more in the cart. Trying to make your card stretch. You bought the formula. The diapers. The Hot Pockets for the boyfriend who won't marry her because marriage means responsibility and responsibility means turning off the PlayStation. Love. Here's what you didn't buy: A father. A sober mother. A church that does its job. The Salvation Army sells used couches now. William Booth started it to pull drunks out of hell. Now it's a thrift shop with a bell ringer. The YMCA has yoga classes. Used to have Bible studies. Young Men's Christian Association. Now it's just a gym where nobody mentions Christ. Mission creep killed them. It's killing us. Acts 2:44-45 KJV: "And all that believed were together, and had all things common; And sold their possessions and goods, and parted them to all men, as every man had need." They didn't petition Rome. They sold their own stuff. Fed their own people. Themselves. 1 Kings 17. Famine. Widow down to flour dust. About to die. Elijah shows up. "Feed me first." She did. "And the barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil fail, according to the word of the LORD" (1 Kings 17:16 KJV). God didn't lobby King Ahab for food stamps. He demanded obedience. Then He provided. Supernaturally. But we don't do that anymore. We gave our mission to Caesar. We traded soul-rescue for 501(c)(3) status. We traded "Go ye therefore, and teach all nations" (Matthew 28:19 KJV) for "Go ye therefore and let the government handle it." Now we're angry. Half screaming about compassion. How dare you cut EBT. What about the children. The other half giddy. Laughing about consequences. Personal responsibility. Bootstraps. Both worship Caesar. Both forgot the church has a job. The church is supposed to rescue that drunk. Not give him a sandwich. Rescue his soul. "Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you" (Matthew 28:20 KJV). The church is supposed to rescue that tweaker. Not with a twelve-step program. With the Gospel. With the kind of power that makes demons scream and chains break. The church is supposed to tell that mom she's worth more than a man who won't look up from a screen. That her kids deserve a father. Tell her the truth. Then help her. Actually help her. With discipleship. With community. With the kind of church Acts 2 describes. But we don't do that. We gave it to Caesar. Now Caesar might take it back. And we're mad. So thank you, EBT. Thank you for doing our job. Thank you for exposing us. For proving we worship you. November 1st might come. Might not. Either way, this isn't about EBT. This is about you. Will you remember your mission? Or keep begging Caesar to do it? The drunk is still outside Dollar General. The tweaker is still dancing. The mom is still trying to stretch your card. The church is still on Twitter. Arguing. "But be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only, deceiving your own selves" (James 1:22 KJV). The Matrix has you. Wake up. TBM