Peanut Butter Balls

This is the dearest story of God's call on a young life and how it has come to fruition. This may be my favorite Coffee Tea and Thee post ever, so if you do not have time to read please come back to it. If you do have time to read it through, take a few minutes more at the end for a word of prayer and a word of praise to our God for a ministry such as this. I received permission to tell this story with my most ardent promise that I would give only God, and none other, full Glory. Soli Deo Gloria.

Once upon a time there was an 11 year-old girl named Fran. She lived in our city, in an affluent neighborhood, went to a good school and a large church. At this early age God began to tender her heart toward those who were hungry. She desired to go into the government housing projects to take food to people. And she wanted to teach Bible stories. She shared this desire with her mother who surprisingly agreed to take her. I'm not sure if this was surprising for Fran's mother, but it certainly would have been for mine. The next Tuesday they loaded up the family car with peanut butter balls, Kool Aid and Bible study materials, and headed to streets unknown. Fran says these were the days when every mother in the south was making peanut butter balls, and every kids had their favorite flavor of Kool Aid. Ah, Iremember those days. On their first visit they slowly drove into the projects, stopped the car and got out. It was only when they pulled out the peanut butter balls that a few kids came around to check them out. The next Tuesday afternoon they attracted a few more, and within a month Fran and her mom had over 20 children leaving the tv and their after-school kickball games, to get a peanut butter ball, a cup of Kool Aid and Fran's Bible lesson. The crowd grew to even higher numbers. You are getting this, right? She was 11.

Fran's mother continued to drive her, and foot the bill for peanut butter balls and Kool Aid, until she was 16. And on Tuesday afternoons no less! Not on a weekend when it might have been more convenient, but on a Tuesday when she had to rush home and get dinner for five children, get their homework and to bed! Fran says she never grumbled or complained. She was raising her children for His service! A true servant of the Lord. I write this to encourage those of you I watch who are doing the same thing. Keep listening to your kids and serving their need to work for God, and keep doling out the money to underwrite their kingdom work. Bless all of you! Then Fran got a license and a car, took over her ministry and drove herself. In her her own words, she says that she was quite proud of her Bible lessons and abilities to keep a crowd coming!

This continued until she went to college. After college she moved away and it was a long time - like 10 years - before she moved back. Okay, hang with me here... One day she was driving an unfamiliar route in an unfamiliar area. Remember she had been gone quite a while. She needed a few groceries and pulled up to some kind of market in a not-so-good area of town. As she was checking out, a young man, African American, kept looking at her oddly. He asked her, "Aren't you Miss Fran?" She said yes, he told her who he was, and she remembered him. He had come to her Bible studies years earlier in the projects. If you know Fran, you would know that she whooped and hollered and gave him a big slap on the back. Made him feel loved and happy and welcome and important.

She must have made him feel all of that because he opened up to her in a few short minutes. He said, "Miss Fran, you know all those Saturdays when you came to teach us Bible stories? I didn't really come for your stories. I came for your peanut butter balls. I would eat one of your peanut butter balls on Tuesday and I would sneak two more and hide them in my pocket. We had very little food. On Wednesday nights we ate at the church. From Wednesday until Sunday when we ate at my grandmother's, I would ration out my two peanut butter ball and be able to make it until I could get back to you on Tuesday. Miss Fran, you kept me from starving."

Are you sobbing yet? I can't tell, write or hear this story without bawling. That very day God grew Manna House. Fran is still feeding people, still whooping and hollering and still making everyone feel loved. She works with churches and businesses and hundreds of volunteers. She asks God to fill the need and then waits to see what will show up. One time someone needed Pepto Bismol for an upset stomach. Reluctantly Fran said Pepto Bismol wasn't really food. Two days later God sent one lone bottle of Pepto Bismol in the middle of a pallet of food. Fran says things like that happen all the time.

Manna House does more than serve food. Manna House serves love. The concrete floors and few rooms are God's workspace. It is holy ground. I know this has been an extra long post, but go here to to read more about it, to volunteer, to take your kids.