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Generous Woman Learns Many Of Her Neighbors Are Going Hungry So She Opens A Restaurant Where Payment Is Optional!

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  • Lisa grew up in a huge family who barely had enough but still gives to neighbors in need.
  • This is something she is proud to have grown up with being generous to others.
  • So when she learned that a lot of their neighbors are going hungry, they created Drexell & Honeybee’s where payment is optional.

Lisa Thomas-McMillan grew up in one of the poorest counties in Alabama, where she learned early in life what the difference is between “want” and “need.”

Although Lisa and her family of 14 from Brewton barely had food to put on their own table, she’d always remember her parents being always kind to their neighbors, helping and giving what they could. This powerful life lesson of generosity is etched in her heart forever!

Photo Credit: Drexell & Honeybees Donations Only Restaurant All Are Welcome (Facebook)

One day, when she was in a grocery store, Lisa offered to cover the cost of the groceries of an elderly woman who struggled to pay for them. Later on she realized there are a lot of elderly people like her who struggle and go hungry everyday. That’s when she decided to take action! So she started to prepare meals for the 27 names she gathered before she goes out to work every morning. 

But then she learned there were still a lot of people going hungry, not just the elderly, and she wanted to do more. So she and her husband set up a food bank and donations-only kitchen called Drexell & Honeybee’s — which Lisa once dreamed of naming her own ice cream shop.

Photo Credit: Drexell & Honeybees Donations Only Restaurant All Are Welcome (Facebook)

Help from a team of volunteers poured in and Lisa works tirelessly to make healthy and delicious home-cooked Southern food. It is pretty much like any other restaurant except that — payment is optional!

There is a donation box on the wall but customers are not required to participate. Donation is totally voluntary.

Photo Credit: Drexell & Honeybees Donations Only Restaurant All Are Welcome (Facebook)

“You could drop $1,000 in there, and I would not know,” Lisa said. “You could drop a quarter in there, and I would not know. And there’s a chance you could give so much more than that quarter, but there’s also the chance that a quarter is everything you had left.”

Lisa is proud to have created a place where everybody can interact with each other and anyone can leave the place with full belly and happy hearts regardless of financial situations. 

Photo Credit: Drexell & Honeybees Donations Only Restaurant All Are Welcome (Facebook)

“A young lady recently told me that what we’re doing here has changed her heart,” she said. “And not because we’re feeding her, but because she’s now volunteering to help others. If I can do that with this? My goodness, that’s it! That’s the joy growing.”

But at the end of every day,it is Lisa who gets to learn and benefit a lot from Drexell & Honeybee’s just as much as they help others. 

“I’ve learned the joy you get when you serve others — and don’t mistake it, joy is not the same as happiness,” she explained. “Happiness is fleeting; joy is something down in your soul.”

Source: Inspire More

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