Her questions made me realize how much of a divine appointment this had been. Here was a woman who was searching for God. Here was a woman who was thirsting after the life that He offered, but who did not know how to find it. And God sent me, who had just an hour earlier been so unwilling to work, to find her and help guide her along the way.
Testimonies
As my thoughts continued (though I was trying to encourage myself that I was doing the right thing) I heard a motor running behind me and made my way to the right side of the sidewalk to let a golfcart pass by. I was deep in thought, thinking about how I was going to pay for the binders I needed, to keep telling people about Jesus, and even if I could afford the binders I had no idea what I would do to get enough inserts (page protectors) and pay for photo copies of the pages at the same time. Even if I had to live on Peanut butter and jelly for the next two or three weeks in order to afford what I needed, I was determined to do it and to be faithful.
As we sat comfortably enjoying our lunches, the nagging feeling in our hearts began to tug louder and louder with each bite. Was it guilt? Undoubtedly guilt was involved -- guilt, not because we had food, but because we knew that with each passing moment we were losing an opportunity to truly live out our Christianity. Finally, we decided to act. Pitching in a few dollars each, we introduced ourselves to the homeless individuals, asking if it would be alright if we could buy them lunch that afternoon.
The first half of the day was rough -- in a period of about three hours, I had only seen one book leave my canvassing bag. At this point, I was discouraged. A few days prior, books had been going out like crazy. But this day and the day before were so slow, and it became a mental battle to even go out into territory. I felt as though I had been praying to deaf ears, and that God no longer heard my cries. Over lunch, I decided it was time to do something different.
It started to get cold and I was considering calling it a night. Yet, I was stubborn in just about everything else I did so why not be stubborn today. I stayed out there at the shore of the beach a while longer. Then, I started hearing police sirens and since I wasn’t sure if they arrested people for being on the beach, after hours, I moved to the boardwalk. Looking down the boardwalk I saw that it was cleaned perfectly. No trash or anything on the ground. They seemed to really take care of it. I decided that I wasn’t going to give up. I said in my mind that I may have had to leave the shore but I could stay on the boardwalk all night. So I resumed asking God to make himself known to me. “What am I supposed to do now?”