Praise God

Every Thursday we have the opportunity to go into Harrismith to do our grocery shopping and any other shopping that we need to do. Since it was not my teams turn to do the grocery shopping and since I had already gotten everything I needed in Durban and Joburg, I almost didn’t go to town. But I did, and boy am I glad I did. As my friend Krista and I were walking down the street, we were met by a Indian man asking for money or something to eat (There is quite a high population of Indians here in SA). At first I was like “Sorry, we don’t have anything” but I was stopped by Krista who suggested to the man that we walk to the store together and treat him to some food. So that’s what we did. As we walked we found out a lot about him. He went by the name of Dan, but his Indian name is actually Dayalan. Anyways, we found out that he had a wife and three kids, but his wife had left him and took the kids, and left him homeless on the streets. We also found out that he had a Bible in his bag and was very excited to share with us about it. Anyways, Krista and I decided to take Dan to KFC (yes, oddly enough, we have KFC here). Dan told us that he would wait outside because he was ashamed and did not want to shame us, but we told him that we were not ashamed of him and that he was welcome to join us. So he ended up coming inside with us. We told him that he could order any meal from the menu, so he picked one and while Krista waited in line to order, I sat down with Dan at one of the tables and began talking with him. He told me more about his life as a homeless man and it broke my heart to hear all the things he has been through and the constant fear he faces on a daily basis. Then he brought up the topic of how our riches are in heaven and that he is here today because of the grace of God. We continued to talk about this for a while and Krista and I shared some other scriptures with him. We also had the opportunity to share with him a little bit about prosperity and how God may not necessarily give us everything we want but He gives us everything we need to survive. We also talked about some of the things that Jesus went through when he was on earth in relation to some of the challenges Dan was facing. We encouraged him to keep his head held high and shared with him that God has a plan for his life. I was so encouraged by Dan’s courage and strength in the face of all the challenges and hardships he has faced, but was excited to be able to encourage him more. As our conversation came to a close, we had the opportunity to pray with him and my heart was deeply touched through our time of prayer. When we were done praying, tears were streaming down both of our faces. Then Krista and I decided to take him to the store and buy him a couple essential toiletries. He was so appreciative and told us that we were angels that God sent to him in his time of need and that we were an answer to his prayers. I was deeply touched by this experience and will never forget it. Dayalan (Dan) Gounder will be in my prayers and I would love if you could pray for him too. Please pray for his safety and that he would continue to seek after God though all of the challenges and hardships that are ahead of him.

Here is a picture of me and Dan…
There is so much more to this story but I had to leave a lot of it out in order to make a semi-short (haha that still didn’t happen) post. But if you would like to know more of the story, please ask.