Testimony of Healing January 27, 2003 Issue

A helping hand

Carrie Becker

When I volunteered to deliver groceries for an organization that provides food and clothing to disadvantaged people, I assumed I'd be taking food to lower-income families in rural areas. However, the people I was asked to service lived in older motels across the street from oceanfront hotels and condos. I had never imagined that there were individuals and families in that area, living in one-room units and struggling for the necessities of life, just steps from the beautiful Atlantic Ocean where tourists vacationed.

One day the coordinator called and asked me to go to a local hardware store to buy a sheet of plastic for a homeless man who wanted to make a tent in the woods. When I stopped by the office to get the credit card, I was surprised to find the man there. He was tall, and his thin, darkly bearded face revealed a man neither young nor old. He had been given two bags of groceries and had only a battered bicycle to carry them. I was glad I was driving a pick-up truck so I could give him a ride. He lifted the bike into the truck bed and sat next to me in the cab.

Usually I'm able to offer encouragement and comfort to others in need, but I'll tell you, that day I was so overwhelmed by the man's situation that I was nearly speechless. But he wasn't. He thanked me for my kindness and went on to tell me how happy he was that he was able to ride a bike. It seems he'd been in a wheelchair for a long time and only recently had been able to walk without it. I was impressed that he was able to be grateful in the face of his homelessness, and I also noticed an attitude of dignity in his demeanor.

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A helping hand

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