There is something I just don’t understand….
Maybe I am naïve, but I try to see the best in everyone. I know that there are people out there that are not the same as I am….or have the same feelings that I have….but what harm comes in hoping that people are generally good?
The reason this comes to mind, is that I recently gave a dollar to an old man panhandling on the street corner across from where I get my gas. I see him there on a regular basis, always in tattered clothes, dirty, having trouble walking, etc.; and this is not the first time that I have given money or something else to him (I once gave him a pair of gloves in the winter which he was very grateful for and I saw him wearing them after that).
But this time…as I pulled away and into the gas station, the car behind me when I gave him the dollar pulls up to get gas as well. The gentleman gets out of the car, and hollers over to me that I just wasted my money and that the guy on the street corner was nothing but a useless old man scamming people out of money. And with that…he started pumping his gas.
I felt both anger and shame for this guy!
How could one be so heartless? Maybe the old man on the street corner was going to use the money for alcohol. Maybe he would use it for drugs. Maybe he would use it for sex. I don’t know!
What I do know…is that I may be taking a chance with this old man…but that I have faith in him that he is going to use what I give him for something he really needs. Clothing…shelter…medicine…etc. I felt confident in my decision; but also still quite mad and ashamed at the other guy pumping gas.
But then God decided to intervene.
The guy had finished pumping his gas and was starting to walk inside when he tripped and fell. At that exact moment, the old man that had been on the street corner was now behind him and offered him a hand in standing back up. The man on the ground took it, stood up, looked at the old man and said, “Thank you sir”.
I got into my car….watching as both of them went inside….hoping that maybe people can change and that the best in everyone can always shine through!
Scott Booker 
Scott