The Rev. Rick Harvey and his wife, Traci, use the word “love” over and over when they talk about their lives and ministry.
It’s the basis of the Soul Food Cafe Mission in Conway, which they started together 15 years ago, and of their 31-year marriage.
“We were babies,” Traci said, laughing. Now the Bigelow couple have seven children and four grandchildren.
They are co-executive directors of the mission, which provides hot meals to hundreds of people each week (and Rick said if everyone knew what a good cook Traci was, it would be more), in addition to giving out food boxes, providing hair cuts, clothing and furniture, and sharing the word of God.
“It’s not just preaching God’s word. … There’s a bigger need — to love people,” Rick said.
“You’d be amazed what a good hug does,” Traci said.
The couple talked in the kitchen of Rock Solid Church, where the mission is operating while its own building is under construction. Traci was busy helping volunteers cook the day’s meal, and she stopped during the interview to good-naturedly prod: “Stir that — don’t just look at it,” or ask questions: “How many pans of spaghetti so far?” As more volunteers came through the door, she hugged each one.
Gloria Ferguson, a retired Conway schoolteacher, said volunteering at the Soul Food Cafe Mission each Tuesday is the most fun she has all week.
“It’s a blessing. I’m amazed at their ability to do all this. They’ve got seven kids, and then they do all this. I’m amazed at their love of Jesus,” she said.
Traci, who was just 15 when she met Rick, said she was attracted to him first because of his moustache, and then she saw his devotion to God that was unlike any other teenage boy she knew. He’d spotted Traci when her high school choir came to sing at his church.
She grew up in Alabama and moved to Arkansas when she was 12; Rick’s family moved from California to Arkansas when his dad retired from the Air Force and wanted a farm.
Moving to Arkansas was a culture shock in a good way for Rick.
“I loved the hospitality, the warmth, the friendliness,” he said, and the lush green landscape. “I could just stare at it; it was so beautiful.”
Traci and Rick knew from the beginning that they wanted to be in ministry.
Traci said she felt like she was called to the ministry when she was 14 or so, but she wasn’t sure how she’d serve. She went to the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, where she majored in voice. Rick received an associate degree in business from UCA, then received a degree in pastoral ministry through correspondence courses in Texas.
The couple were full-time youth pastors and started moving around — Searcy, West Memphis, North Little Rock — for 10 years.
“I was raising kids,” Traci said — six boys and a girl. She and Rick both wanted a big family, Traci said. She was raised as an only child because her siblings were 18 and 13 years older than her, and she didn’t want her children to be alone; Rick had five sisters.
She home-schooled their children, too.
“It was hectic,” Traci said. Rick stopped his ministry and sold insurance to make ends meet. “He still does; that’s how we make our living,” she said. Their ministry is supposedly “on the side,” she said.
The Harveys wanted their children to get a broad view of religion, and they took the kids to different denominations of churches in Conway, from Baptist to Catholic.
“We wanted them to see that in every church, there were people who loved Jesus with all their heart,” Traci said. “The name on the building didn’t matter. God looks at the heart.”
Traci said she dreamed of opening a soup kitchen for 16 years before it became a reality in 2001.
Rick became the pastor of the former Christ Church on Bronnie Lane in Conway.
“While he was pastoring for six months with that little church, we had started feeding. Church was going nowhere; the food stuff was going crazy,” she said.
They started the free meals at a now-closed Conway restaurant, and three months later, they moved the operation full time to the Christ Church building.
“It was out of obedience,” Traci said. “The word says he will give you the desires of your heart. Not that he’ll give you a pink Cadillac — it’s because he gives you the desires of your heart. It’s your purpose; it’s your plan.”
The Harveys ran the Soul Food Cafe Mission — a name Traci suggested for its double meaning of soul food — for five years before Christ Church burned in 2006. Someone set fire to a mattress on the front porch, she said.
They immediately moved the mission to Four Winds Church. “We never missed a beat,” Traci said.
Rick said they didn’t take the fire as a sign to stop what they were doing. “It’s one of those things in life. You don’t do a ministry like this and not have obstacles. We’d say, ‘Lord, if you want us to keep it going, where do you want us to go?’”
That’s a question they’ve had to ask again and again, and answers have always come.
The Four Winds gymnasium, where the mission’s food was stored, burned in 2011 after a fire started on a charger attached to a forklift.
Despite the bad luck, Traci said, three churches in Conway offered to let them use their facilities, “which I thought was crazy,” she said, laughing.
They moved the operation to Second Baptist Church’s location on Harkrider Street, where they stayed for 2 1/2 years. The mission stayed an additional two years when the church built a new facility and the former church location became The Ministry Center. When The Ministry Center needed the space to expand its programs, the center gave the Soul Food Cafe Mission four months to find another home.
It wasn’t until a week before the deadline this month that the Harveys knew what they were going to do.
Traci asked God if it was time to shut down the ministry.
Rick said he had lunch with Terry Davis, a friend and the pastor of Rock Solid Church in Conway, and Davis offered the use of the church.
That’s where the Harveys were working this particular day. U.S. Department of Agriculture food boxes were being given out, along with a hot meal. Two church services are held, with Rick and other pastors in the community leading. No one is required to attend, they said.
The Soul Food Cafe Mission feeds anywhere from 280 to 340 people each week; at Thanksgiving, the mission served 600 meals. Every Tuesday, 300 food boxes are given out, plus USDA food boxes the third Tuesday each month. The mission’s programs are available to anyone, and participants come from several counties, including Faulkner, Conway, White, Perry and Pulaski.
“Atheists, transgender, drug dealers — we really don’t care. If they won’t enter the church, who’s going to tell them about Jesus?” Rick said. “There’s not anybody we wouldn’t take.
“We try real hard to treat people with respect and dignity.”
“People come and tell us if it wasn’t for Soul Food, they’d have nothing in their cupboards,” he said. Elderly
residents tell the Harveys their money for food often goes to buy medication, so the free meals are lifesavers.
“Homeless say that because they have a hot meal … they don’t have to dumpster-dive,” he said.
The programs survive on donations from churches, individuals and businesses.
The Harveys’ mission will soon have a permanent home. Their building has been under construction for eight years at 1717 S. Donaghey Ave., and Rick said that thanks to a $160,000 bank loan this month and lots of donated supplies, it finally looks like they’ll finish the building and move in within three or four months.
“We needed more [money], but we’re going to try to use a lot of volunteer work and friends helping, especially in the kitchen, to lower the cost,” Traci said.
“It’s almost unbelievable, but the community has rallied around us,” Rick said.
The Harveys said they are happy spending their lives helping people in need.
“Every person has a journey,” Rick said. “It’s not our job to get them to their destination, only to help them on their way.”
Traci said she asks God to help her see people as he sees them.
“I feel like God picks out who’s here, and we’re just supposed to love on them,” she said.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.