Faith Stories: A New Outlook on Life
I usually do my grocery shopping at Winn-Dixie, but this day I decided to shop at Wal-Mart. As I shopped, I noticed that I kept crossing paths with a modest, but nicely groomed middle-aged man wearing a dress shirt, tie, and khaki pants. Upon walking near him again in the meat department, he spoke to me, saying “Hey, how are you doing?” He said I looked familiar but couldn’t figure out how he knew me. I had realized he’d been a client at the Shepherd’s Market and told him that’s where he’d seen me.
I remembered him because we had talked when he came to the pantry a few times over several months. He had struck me as a nice guy and I remember us talking about our common experience raising boys. At that time, this man had been going through rough times: a failed marriage, losing his job and trying to raise a teenager. He had told me it was the lowest place in his life so far.
But now, as I talked to him in Wal-Mart, he looked great and had a new outlook on life. He told me how he’d gotten a good job and thanked me and the Shepherd’s Market for being so kind and helpful in a dark time of his life. He said that dark place was even more noticeable once he had come out of it to the other side. Then he exclaimed, “Look, I’m buying my own groceries!” What a privilege to be God’s hands and feet walking with a fellow child of God through the rough places and then to see the light on the other side.
Deirdre’ Halliburton