The Red Cup
She has a red cup.
That's what I notice first, sitting near the end of the table, a red cup flanked by a water bottle and two Mountain Dews. Old habits die hard.
Setting The Big Table
The Big Table Dinner Church meets twice monthly in a small room at the transitional housing facility. Nick opens with a prayer. I lean in the doorway to quickly move to the dimly lit hallway, where I will serve slices of pizza from boxes stacked on a cluttered entry table. As we bow our heads, I notice she is quietly crying, obviously trying to hide her distress.
My friend Rachel and I place two pieces of pizza on each paper plate as Tim, Frank, and Nick move in and out, serving the guests. That task completed, Rachel chooses her pizza and sits down across from Lief, starting a conversation about the famous person he is named after. Tim and Frank scatter to chat and eat with other guests. They raise their hands and call for more napkins, forks, or ranch dressing (a favorite pizza condiment at The Big Table).
As Nick and I spread throughout the room, I see her raise her hand. “Do you have those red pepper packets?” I tell her I am sorry we don’t, so she asks for more ranch dressing. When I bring it to the table, I strike up a conversation.
I'm Here to Cry With You
“So, you like hot and spicy?” She nods her head. “What other spicy things do you like to eat?”
She starts rattling off a list of foods, but her voice quickly trails away. She wipes her eyes and apologizes. “I have cancer. I am just now recovering to the point that I can start eating again. This is my first time here. When I saw you were serving Pizza Hut…” More tears. More apologies. “I grew up in western Kansas. All our town had was a Pizza Hut.” She is overwhelmed, unable to go on, unable to eat.
“Do you want to step out into the hall with me?” I ask gently, my hand on her shoulder. She sniffs and nods.
In the hall, she starts telling me her story of a 7-inch-long tumor removed from under her tongue. How she couldn’t eat. Lots of therapy. At one point, she could only pour room-temperature water into the lid of a bottle and sip it by turning her head toward her shoulder.
She breaks down. I ask her if she would let me hug her. Nodding, she leans into my arms, sobs wracking her body. I hug her tightly.
It subsides. She steps away and apologizes for crying. I try to console her, though I must admit to feeling overwhelmed and helpless.
“You do not have to be sorry," I say. "I am here to cry with you.”
People move in and out of the hall: the director who runs the homeless shelter, servers fixing seconds, latecomers to the table. She is self-conscious, but there is nowhere else to go. She looks so dejected that I reach out to hold her again as she weeps into my shoulder, apologizing when she has breath. The hall clears. We hear Nick reading the Jesus story. She says, “I should go back in there.” She turns, takes a step, and immediately the tears flow.
“We don’t have to go back in. It’s okay. We can stay out here and talk,” I assure her. She steps towards me for another hug. I whisper, “How long has it been since you have had someone to hold you when you cry?”
She shakes her head. “I don’t know.” Tears, sobs, sniffs, arms wrapped around each other. She continues to tell her story when she is able to speak, then clings to me, head on my shoulder when the emotion floods her. The story comes in fragments. She has lost her job, her home. Lost her ability to speak clearly. Lost the capacity to enjoy normal food. In a moment of wry humor, she grins, “I even lost 95 pounds. It’s a good thing I had all that extra weight.”
The Shortest Verse in the Bible
I look her in the eye. “I am so sorry. You have suffered much. You are an overcomer.” More tears. More hugs. More apologies. Again, I whisper, “Do you know what the shortest verse in the Bible is?”
She shakes her head. “It’s ‘Jesus wept.’ Did you know that Jesus wept?” Again, she shakes her head and gulps out a sob. I continue murmuring words of comfort. “He expects us to cry. You do not have to apologize. Jesus created us with emotions. I am sure that He is crying with us right now. He created the world to be good, but sin destroyed it. Life was not designed to be like this.”
Her story pours forth. “I have an appointment tomorrow. I don’t know what the doctor will say. I have been feeling really tired lately. I am worried. I only know one other person with the rare type of cancer I have, and he died.” She clings to me, unable to go on; I hug her fiercely.
Again, I whisper, “You know, we all are going to die. Everybody dies. Are you afraid to die?”
She nods, shoulders shaking.
“Then cry out to Jesus. Cry out to Him.”
She is quiet and heads back into the gathering space. I follow. She hesitates at the doorway. “Go on,” I tell her, “I will sit with you.” The story draws to a close. Nick prays. Thank yous and goodbyes are shared as the director leads the guests out of the building; Nick urges them to take another bottle of water or pop on their way out.
The Red Cup
She lingers, intently sifting through pictures on her phone. She wants to show me what her mouth looked like before and after the tumor. But she can’t find it. I urge her to leave with the others. I don’t want her to get locked out of the dorm, left to spend the night on the streets. She puts the Mountain Dew and water bottles in the big pockets of her oversized coat, uneaten pizza in one hand, red cup in the other. I tell her I will be praying for her. She thanks me.
Will I see her again at The Big Table in two weeks? What will the doctor say? Will she find more permanent housing? Will she recover? Will she die? I don’t know the answers to these questions, but I do know that Jesus met her at The Big Table with a Supreme from Pizza Hut and a Mountain Dew poured into her red cup.