Our mission is to walk with women beyond the boundaries of poverty and neglect and assist them in finding their purpose.

Editor's note: This post originally appeared January 25, 2022. With Valentine's Day near, we thought this message to still be quite relevant and worth sharing again. Thank you for reading.

I recall Valentine’s Day class parties when I was in lower school. We all decorated cardboard shoe boxes with red and pink construction paper hearts and made a slit in the lid for classmate mail.  We were in an all-girl school, so the messaging was perfunctory and silly.

     “I’m hooked on you”, for example, with a fishhook dangling before a small fish.

     “You are such a cutie! “You are a berry good friend”, with a picture of a bowl of fruit. And so, it went. Those were the days of innocence and neighborhood friendships.

Last week we had a round table discussion among our ladies at the House, regarding sex, romance, husbands, boyfriends, and marriage. Many of the women who spoke up wished they had “woke up” to the warnings in their youth by their mothers and grandmothers.  Eros, the love that can draw us into romance without commitment, and sex without promise, is advertised ubiquitously and alleged to be the ultimate love. However, it comes with small print directions and warnings. Frequently what today’s society calls love has brought beautiful children into the world for our community yet left many as single moms parenting and providing for several children alone while living dependent on family, friends, and government assistance.

In the New Testament, there are four Greek words used to describe different types of love – Eros, Storge, Philleo, and Agape.

Eros, or romantic love, is what we discussed last week. And when Eros evaporated, the trusted love of family called Storge helped keep the future hopeful and taught our friends how to make a way in hardship with real friends.  

As many shared at the table, tears flowed. Two of our ladies were faithful to their unfaithful husbands and cared for them in failing health and terminal illness.  They buried them with dignity, though their own was lost.  One has had multiple fathers to her children, and they all are missing in the parenting of them.  Two have husbands without work and young children at home.  One gave birth to a child after being raped at age 12.  Some of the women were sharing for the first time.

We cultivate Storge in Orange Mound. We women are sturdy, and we are strongest when working together in community. We all have invisible Valentine's boxes with lids.  Encouragement comes in multiple forms as we invest our resources compassionately through the small, concealed openings in the box. Allowing others to know our heartaches, opens the box covered in tattered Valentine's hearts and cheap expressions that belie the truth of the struggles of single moms. Faith in Christ changes the tattered to the eternal.

We befriend, support, equip, and promote the ladies in our neighborhood.  We try to absorb the pain from the wounds of the past by listening, sharing the burdens, grieving, and resourcing. Whether financial, medical, housing, educational, or some other unmet need, we intervene when the ladies want us to, and help in the best ways we can. Our moms are revered at The House. The struggles of raising kids in the inner city are myriad and the fears of gun violence in their neighborhoods are palpable. Crime abounds with hair-trigger anger among the frustrations of poverty and the pandemic. We pray for all with unconditional support and grace.

For those who have believed in Jesus, our Savior, husband, and father to our children, we have become sisters in faith and embraced Philleo.  We are a spiritual family. Philleo brings honor and accountability to our friendships and motivates us to serve together and help all who have lost their bearings. Family always has priority, whether in security or need.  Our Prince, The Prince of Peace, opens the finest of loving relationships among individuals in this family that also packages and sells lovely teas.

The evidence of the redemption of our past is in our assurance of the AGAPE love of our Lord.  He is Whom we serve and ultimately long to please.  We return Agape to Him, in part, by loving our neighbors as ourselves, those inside and outside the House at 3028 Carnes.

For single moms, Jesus is their Bridegroom, Husband, and Comforter. For their children, He is their Shield and Defender, Protector and Provider. His Agape is contagious, irresistible, and available to us all.

Since at least the 15^th century, tea and the ritual of the Japanese ceremony have been an integral part of not only the culture of Japan, but the political machinations of emperors, warriors, and business tycoons. Kristin Surtak, a professor of Japanese politics, says the tea ceremony is presented as a place of equality. It is said to be about wa, kei, sei, and jaku, which are harmony, respect, purity, and tranquility - concepts believed to be understood by anyone from any culture.

In the early twentieth century, the Japanese tea ceremony became essential to trade negotiations and growing business relationships. While the ceremony remained ornate with the beauty and fragility of the elements used to convey wealth and power, the process was intended to invoke humility. It is said that magnates like J.P. Morgan and John D. Rockefeller actually knelt and served themselves, as required by the ceremony. Kneeling and serving oneself signals that everyone in the room is on the same level. Being on one’s knees can be vulnerable, uncomfortable, and intimidating unless everyone else is on their knees too.

At the House, we discuss the importance of humility, and everyone strives to model it. We are intentional about facilitating situations where everyone is on the same “level.” Affluent white women from East Memphis pull weeds in our gardens beside Black women from Orange Mound. Volunteers peel and place branded stickers on shiny foil packages alongside the ladies who are doing the same to earn a paycheck. Employees sit on our board of directors, participate in discussions, and vote on proposals.

We’re not naïve. We understand that some bank accounts have more in them than others. We know that affluency, education, and even race sometimes come with advantages. We know some have traveled the world while others have barely left the boundaries of their neighborhoods. We know that some have access to the best doctors and treatments for illnesses while others lack a primary care physician. And we recognize that culture often equates human worth to net worth.

Yet, there is one place where we know that there is not one iota of difference between us.

On our knees in prayer.

It’s not very often that anyone physically gets on their knees at the House. Some of us would struggle to get up again. When we are in prayer together though, which is daily, we are on our knees in our hearts. Like the tycoons of the tea ceremony, we are vulnerable, maybe a little uncomfortable, and not intimidated because we are all on the same level before God.

And it is during these times that we see clearly that the emotions of grief, loss, fear, anxiety, inferiority, disappointment, frustration, anger, and the like live in every zip code, every neighborhood, every street, every home, and every heart. From this, unlike the participants in the tea ceremony, we don’t serve ourselves but seek to serve others.

“Truly I understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him.” – Acts 10:34-35

A momma bear is willing to stand between her children and an entire army to protect and defend.

I met the personification of her several weeks ago when she arrived at The House inquiring what we do on our corner in Orange Mound.

“We offer secure jobs,” I explained, and she began to cry.

Her story was familiar, but her layers of need were staggering. It was late in the day, and we assured her an interview the following Monday.  Because she appeared to be only in her 20’s, we wrongly surmised her aspirations would be unfolding, and we would be a logical step in her discovering her career path.

She arrived early on Monday and pieces of her story unraveled before us as she shared the life that she had led in a wilderness otherwise known as the streets. Her past had been tightly tied and knotted in adversity. We learned she and her siblings had been abandoned by their mother, and DCS assigned them to multiple foster homes where she was sexually abused.  She lived in the streets, meaning she was homeless, unemployed, and dependent on handouts.  Injustices were her companions, and she trusted no one.  She couldn’t finish high school.   She was raped more than once along the way and has two daughters. One is special needs.

Undaunted, she has pieced together enough money to rent a worn-out, broken-down miserable three bedroom, one bath house a short distance from My Cup of Tea. She is “Momma Bear” to 4 of her brother’s sons, 3 of her half-sister’s sons, and her own 2 daughters. All of them live in the 3 bedroom dump for which her 2 siblings help match the exorbitant rent the Mama Bear calls home. Meanwhile she is applying to DCS to get custody of her deceased sister’s 6 sons who have been in foster care for a year. “I’m all they got,” she lamented as her story commanded our attention in the front office where we were all sitting.

She was resolute that she had to get her sister’s kids out of foster care, or they would never survive.

Her immediate need is furniture for the DCS inspection of her home.  I offered to go home with her and look and see what we might be able to request of friends who give generously to our mission.

Most people aren’t aware of how bleak some living conditions in our city can be. I respectfully commended her for her housekeeping in deplorable conditions. The bathroom sinks pipe empties freely into the cabinet below it where a small bowl overflows with every use.  There is a noticeable soft section in the kitchen floor that forewarns a breakthrough to the ground sooner than later. There is a boarded-up window in the living room, and menacing floor furnaces in the hall and kitchen area.

The 7 male kids sleep on 2 mattresses laid on the floor with their parent. Her daughters sleep in her bed without linens. There are 2 TVs, and a small table with 2 chairs.  There is a washing machine, but the dryer is busted.  Clothes are piled in every corner, since there are no hangers for the closets and no drawers or chests for folding clothes. Thirteen people call it home. She is completely dependent on a check she gets for her special needs daughter, and SNAP, formerly known as “food stamps,” which is government issued for low- and no-income parents.

She now has an income stream that is based on her work, and she has an army standing solidly with her instead of against her.

She is our newest employee.  She sports 2 new custom uniforms with her name embroidered.  She has been to the Neighborhood Christian Center clothes closet and has clothes that fit her amply. She comes to work early daily, in a car that sounds like a cement mixer but is able to make the round trips from home to Hanley Elementary to My Cup of Tea. She paid a small loan we gave her for a used tire back to us with her first paycheck. Now the car has one reliable paw.  She is offered our leftovers to feed her children and is only recently aware of the food pantry access and delivery Ms. Pearl brings to us weekly.

If only a small part of this story is true, we have no choice but to stand with this Momma Bear.

Cynics don’t peruse Isaiah 57 as our MCOT sisters and volunteers often do.

Isaiah 57:6-11

Our friend who calls herself “Momma Bear” has one mission in mind, and that is to get all of her cubs under one roof where she can protect them from the predators in the wilderness she grew to hate. We have a mission as well, which is to  bring light to her darkness and strengthen her resolve to trust her Creator whom we serve and obey and gladly share His grace.