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Elise Stevens, more affectionately known as MeeMaw by her community, runs a pay-what-you-can restaurant in Union, Ore., fueled by faith, that feeds hundreds every week.
“No kid is ever expected to pay, and adults are only expected to pay what they truly can afford,” Stevens told Fox News Digital.
“I have no other source of income… God made it very clear that we were to only do this ministry. This is a ministry more than it is a restaurant,” the owner of MeeMaws Hometown Kitchen continued.
Stevens, who donates all of her earned social media income back into the eatery, opened the spot last June. Her story and how she arrived here traces back to a highly abusive relationship she escaped nearly 20 years ago.
“I was held hostage for five months while pregnant with my oldest daughter. I gave birth while in captivity and when she was three weeks old, I escaped captivity and I met my husband,” MeeMaw said. “I had to take my safety into my own hands, so I jokingly asked a friend if he would be my bodyguard, and just a few weeks later we ended up getting married, and we’re still married today.”
The mother maintained such positivity through “studying spiritual warfare” to strive every day to “live like Jesus.”
“I was mad at the God that religion taught me about… I stopped being angry. I started forgiving and in doing so, I started to find myself again,” she said.
Stevens, who says she cooks 30 to 80 meals a day for children a day at no cost to them, is often asked how her eatery gets funded to continue to feed so many people.
“I make an income off of social media. I make [an] income off telling my story to different outlets, different areas, and any form of money that I make off of my story gets donated back to my restaurant,” she said. “We’re also funded by donations from people all over the United States.”
Stevens added, “I don’t do this for the fame, I literally give God all the glory. This is God’s restaurant, this is God’s path, and God’s led me here, and this is what I do for Him.”
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