For months I've been telling him about God's abundant provision. I've wondered at times if he thinks I'm crazy. I've wondered at times if I think I'm crazy! You see, we have almost nothing, he and I. Neither one of us knows week to week how we will pay our rent, or our electricity bill. So then there's me, showing up on his doorstep with a few pieces of fruit and my lousy attempt at a hot meal, banging on about God's abundant provision. “But,” I'll say, “God has provided an abundance of these vegetables.” He'll nod and smile.
So tonight I'm praying as I butter the bread. “Father God, teach me how to speak about your abundant provision. Glorify your name. Amen.” And then I'm knocking on the door. He's not exactly spry. He has a lot of back pain and struggles to get around. But tonight he's on the scene toot sweet. And when he answers, he seems a bit more eager to talk. The last few times we've spoken have been quite brief. But tonight he wants to share.
He tells me about some of his challenges. About how his unemployment benefits cover only his rent, and nothing more. About how he relies virtually entirely on the generosity of a few family members, friends and neighbours to eat. I blink away a tear when he talks about the last $20 in his savings account. The very last of his 'buffer'. He had to transfer half of it out to pay for his pain medication. And his discouraging search for work continues, all the while struggling with a hunch, and a painful back. I ask him how often he's able to have a proper cooked meal. He tells me that dinner is usually tinned tuna mixed with mayonnaise.
He asks me how I've been. Its been a particularly ordinary day, and I can't disguise the intense spasms that overtake my lungs every few moments. I explain it away. “It's a side effect of the medication. But it's far preferable to the wheeze I had before! And anyway, overall I'm really good. In fact I'm fit as a fiddle! And God is sustaining me. And providing abundantly. In many (unspecified) ways.”
That's enough, right? That's my job done. It felt like a clean, crisp finish- perhaps a gentle dabble in the ol' Christianese, an art I've well and truly mastered, but nothing too overwhelming. I bid him farewell, noting that I'm yet to eat, and its getting on. Plus the bowl of curry in his hand is probably stone cold.
But he keeps talking. He won't let me go. He's not finished. He tells me about how he'd prayed to God- cried out that God would provide for him in the midst of his deep need. And then it comes completely out of left field. A story of God's abundant provision. I really should have been expecting it, of course, but at first I don't recognise it, because it begins in much the same way as all the other stories.
He recently bumped into an old colleague and friend. He told him about the tough times he was going through. That friend kindly shared the last $15 in his wallet. A while later, while doing his banking, he noticed that his friend had generously put a further sum of money- a significant sum- into his bank account. In this way, through this friend's generosity, God had restored that meagre buffer which once again stands between him and homelessness.
I'm amazed, and I'm praising God out loud, verbalising my thankfulness for God's abundant provision. But he continues. Around the same time, he was on the phone to his telecom company, trying to sort out a $260 bill which he was unable to pay. He was talking to the phone operator about some of his present challenges, and he agreed to a hardship provision. He would pay in instalments- $10 each fortnight until the $260 had been paid in full. But later that afternoon, he received a call back from the same operator. He'd spoken to his boss, and management had agreed to waive the entire bill. The $260 debt was being completely wiped. God's mercy was streaming forth from the most unlikely place- a telecom company call centre.
Suddenly I don't feel quite so crazy. Suddenly I'm not the only one talking about God's abundant provision. I'm not even the loudest one talking about God's abundant provision! We stand together, shaking our heads in silent amazement.
Back at home, I sit down to enjoy my curry. But before I tuck in, I pray a prayer of overflowing thankfulness. For God had surely provided an abundance of those vegetables. And God had surely provided so, so much more.