Brenda’s Bigger Burger, Fayetteville, Arkansas

Brenda’s Bigger Burger

“You carry them away like a flood; they are like a sleep. In the morning they are like grass which grows up: in the morning it flourishes and grows up; in the evening it is cut down and withers.” Psalm 90:5-6

Brenda’s Bigger Burger was a landmark in Fayetteville, Arkansas for several generations. I used to tell people they could find our church just five blocks south of Brenda’s Bigger Burger on S. Hill Ave. Now Brenda’s establishment has been reduced to a small pile of concrete and other building debris. After it closed, the building remained intact for a while. A local homeless man had taken up residence under one of the eaves. Thankfully that man now has a home, but Brenda’s is gone. No more burgers, no more fries, no more milk shakes and no more Brenda’s. 

I learned from a friend who knew the family who ran Brenda’s that they were tired of the daily toil. For the last 20 years Brenda’s was only opened from about 11:00 a.m. to around 2:00 or 3:00 p.m. They only served the lunch crowd. And the lunch crowd either ate at a couple of concrete tables or else they took it with them because there was no indoor serving area. You ordered at the window, picked it up and headed home, to the park, back to work or wherever you could find a good place to dine. Brenda’s made a good, old fashioned greasy burger. 

I’m not sure how long Brenda’s thrived in Fayetteville. However long it was, it probably seems just like a sleep, as the psalmist describes life in Psalm 90:5-6. Just like the grass grows up and then is cut down and withers, so Brenda’s shuffled on and off the scene. That pile of concrete just five blocks up the street from my home congregation is a metaphor, a symbol, a simile. It reminds us just how frail and short life is. 

Brenda’s Bigger Burger fulfilled its mission though. They served countless hungry people who thronged to their window over the years. I’m sure there was laughter and fun and some satisfying eating. I’m sure there was labor and sorrow, too. But that mission has now been passed on to some other establishments in town. Brenda’s has been cut off and has flown away. 

The metaphor of the grass in this psalm is repeated in other passages as well. Jesus used this illustration in the sermon on the mount: “Now if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is, and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will He not much more clothe you, O you of little faith?” (Matthew 26:30). Jesus reminds us that God’s care and concern over the grass, which is so often clothed in splendor, should be a source of comfort and strength to us lest our faith should falter. God cares for the grass and he cares for the birds and he cares for us. 

The Apostle Peter reminds us that the grass stands in sharp contrast to God’s word: “All flesh is as grass, and all the glory of man as the flower of the grass. The grass withers, and its flower falls away, but the word of the Lord endures forever. Now this is the word by which the gospel was preached to you” (1 Peter 1:24-25).

-Scott Gage

Fayetteville, Arkansas