Hi-Line Living: Feeding the soul

Janet Tams likes to say her job as director of Feed My Sheep Soup Kitchen on 2nd Street in Havre was "heaven sent."

Three years ago, Tams, a Havre native, who spent 30 years living and raising her family in California, came back home.

Before heading off to an appointment with job services, she said a prayer, asking God to help her find a job that would allow her to simultaneously make a living and serve the community.

Soon after, Tams was approached by a woman she knew from the local McDonald's.

"And so she described to me this," she said, indicating the soup kitchen, "and I said 'Wow, this is exactly what I pictured.'"

Now, six days a week, Tams works to deliver to the less fortunate something that seems so basic, but to many is such a blessing: a hot meal.

Feed My Sheep was started in 1989, by Immanuel Baptist Church but  has always been staffed by volunteers from a range of Christian denominations. Eventually, when the kitchen became too much for one church to manage, other churches and members of the community operated it as a joint effort.  

Over the years the number of meals served has risen from 10,000-12,000 a year when it first began to 19,000 last year.   

Between noon and 12:45 p.m., Monday through Saturday, a long line reaches from the kitchen counter in the small brown building that houses Feed My Sheep, out the door and onto the sidewalk. The line slowly inches forward, each person taking a tray of food.

Once served and seated, one of the revolving cast of ministers or priests from Havre's association of churches, leads the flock in prayer and shares a brief devotional. With heads bowed and hands clasped they absorb the spoken words, until the prayer is punctuated with an "amen."

Tams and Father Dan Wathen, pastor of St. Jude Thaddeus Church who sits on the board that operates Feed My Sheep, said the place is not the stereotype of what many think a soup kitchen is. Its clientele are not unkempt drunkards, sleeping on park benches being served bowls of soup.

"Most of it is young families, and that is what strikes me," said Wathen, adding that for both its volunteers and those who rely on the soup kitchen, it is also a support network which helps people get back on their feet.

It is the generosity of Havre, more than anything, that sustains this kitchen. As Tams said, it is more of a community operation then anything.

Beyond administration from the churches, individuals, businesses and entities help by staffing the kitchen and providing both financial and in-kind support.

The kitchen operates with the help of about 20 volunteers.

Businesses, such as Gary & Leo's Fresh Foods and Pizza Hut, donate food and additional food comes from drives held by schools and donations of leftover food from civic groups, such as the Kiwanis and Havre Eagles Club.

The building itself has been maintained by community organizations. Boys Scouts have painted it, while the Lions Club redid the floors. Triangle Communications also bought them a new refrigerator.

Wathen said that any day at Feed My Sheep is full of surprises.

"In this role you really don't know what is going to come through the door," he said.

Jerry Williams, chair of the board that oversees Feed My Sheep, said that one day, last spring a man he had never seen before gave Tams $400 in cash for the soup kitchen.

Last summer there was what can best be described as a modern incarnation of the fishes and loaves miracle, Tams said.

She had a line of about 60 people that stretched out the door, when she realized that she was running out of food. Then the door opened, and someone from a local school came in with bags of chicken and rice to give to the kitchen.

"And so we opened the bags and fed them out of there," said Tams. "It was just enough to feed the last 20 or so who came in."