Thankfulness
I met Matthew last week. It was snowing and he was sitting near Smith's on Mountain City Highway. I noticed him while I going toward the library. I don't know exactly why I went down the side street; I think I just felt drawn to the place. I passed the car wash and almost missed him. He was wearing a green coat which blended with the shed behind which he had taken shelter. I jogged up the slope to the place where he was and asked him how he was doing. He said he was doing fine and that he was surprised by the snow when he woke up.
After more talk about the weather, he said that he had lost his antibiotics. He showed me the sores his left hand, and I offered some of the antibiotic ointment I had bought minutes ago for my leg. He declined, saying it was an internal virus or something.
I wasn't hungry and offered him the lunch out of my backpack and what money I had. He took it gladly, and I asked him what he knew about Jesus Christ. He said: "I believe in the Man, I believe in the Son. I just don't understand why He has to make me suffer so much." I wanted to quote the Bible on this subject, or to say that God will make it right in the end, but, because I had not felt the pain he had felt, I kept silent.
He told me that his mother had recently died, and he had been in prison for eight years. He continued speaking and over the next hour I realized how much I take for granted, and how wrong I had been, believing that every homeless man is homeless by choice. He told me about his travels, his family, and how he came to Nevada. He spoke of his friends that had died, his sister in Hawaii, his lung problem, and how walking a block is exhausting for him because of it. He spoke of places he'd been, and people he'd met, things he'd seen.
He talked about what he wanted to do in his life, about how he wanted to counsel teenagers, but he couldn't because he was a former criminal. He said he wanted to make a difference in at least one kid's life.
Well, whether he knows it or not, he made a difference in mine. I was convicted by his actions and his words. When we parted he was genuinely thankful! For some fruit and maybe twenty bucks? Thankfulness, even for much more than that, is not something I and my countrymen practice often. Many of us could learn from his example. Many of us could practice thankfulness much, much more than we do.
