Oysters

A little while ago we had a new mom come to the shelter. She and her 5 year old son were homeless, with nothing to their names but a trash bag of clothes and an old kid's backpack. The son was happy, easy-going, and had a silver-toothed smile that lit up a room. I loved him instantly. His mom was a private person who was not accustomed to the structure and accountability The Sheepfold had. Her first night was especially difficult (which is common for most new families) and conversation around the dinner table was awkward. I tried to draw her into conversation, but didn't get anywhere. I wanted so badly to put her at ease, but nothing worked.

When I'm working I try to make meal time engaging for the kids, keeping conversations light-hearted and requiring them to use their imaginations. I have so many great and hilarious memories of the crazy things that have come out of some of these kid's mouths. It's so ridiculously fun that sometimes I marvel at the fact that I get paid to do this. Dinner time is usually my favorite part of each shift.

Since getting the mom to let her guard down wasn't working, I asked her son if he would be willing to share with everyone what the grossest thing he'd ever eaten was. This question had sparked a half-hour of banter the night before and by the end of it some of us were laughing so hard that we cried. The boy replied that the grossest thing he'd ever eaten was the roasted potatoes I made for dinner that night. Lovely. :-) Side conversations around the table paused for a moment and everybody looked at him in surprise and tried to contain a giggle. More shocked than offended, I asked him what his favorite food was, to which he instantly replied, "canned smoked oysters... and crab legs".  Everyone was shocked to hear this come out of a 5-year-old's mouth... in my experience they usually have to be coaxed to eat anything that doesn't resemble a happy-meal.

Just so you can get the full effect, this is what canned smoked oysters look like:

Yummy!

The moms all looked at me with a pleading look because they knew I had been making mental notes of what people's favorite foods were so I could pick them up at the store if it was affordable. No one else wanted to be served oysters except for his mom who said they were one of her favorite foods too. Unfortunately this is not the type of item I would purchase since no one else in the house would eat it and it can be expensive. Sad day, I know.

The next day was Thursday which is the only day each week where two house managers are at the shelter together. This is necessary because we do all our shopping, office paperwork, and thrift store pick-ups on this day. It's a long, busy day but I enjoy the camaraderie and how many things we're able to check off our to-do list. We visit our thrift store first so that we don't purchase any items that were already donated for our use. There is a back room for the shelters where there are shelves of food items and several freezers for storing perishables.

As I walked into the back room I tripped over a bag. Sometimes there are so many donations, or too little help, that the back room gets flooded with bags that need to be sorted and organized. The bag I tripped over was from a donation that had come in earlier that day and it was full of these:

Never before this day had anyone donated canned smoked oysters and never since then have any showed up in our supplies. What's even stranger is that this is the exact brand that our mother and son loved. I packed them into our van and brought them back with me, along with the dozens of other supplies we picked up. Everything the new mom had said she desperately needed was available in donation piles that day: shirts, shoes, jeans, slippers, a bathrobe, toiletries, jackets, etc. I shook my head and smiled in awe of how love can be demonstrated in a million little ways and struck with how many different people it took to provide all the things we brought home...but mostly I thought about the oysters.

I presented the cans of oysters to that little boy and his mom when I got home and with a big grin he thanked me for getting them for him. I explained that I didn't, that it was a total stranger who donated them just for him even though they'd never met. I said they were waiting in a bag on the floor and I practically tripped over them before I saw them. He didn't care how they came to be in his possession, he was just thrilled to get to have them with dinner.

So, tell me, what are the chances? I didn't have to ask him what his favorite food was, he didn't have to tell me, the donor didn't have to donate them, they didn't have to be the exact brand that was wanted, they didn't have to have been donated that day, someone else could have taken them before I got there, how many people buy canned oysters anyway??? :-)

I believe this happened because it is one little way God chose to demonstrate His tangible and personal love to his precious children. It was a little, unnecessary, even silly thing. Yet to me and to this mom it was a confirmation that, for the time being, she was right where she was supposed to be and that she could find refuge here.

You are not alone. You are precious. You are loved.

Believe it.

Humble yourselves, then, under God's mighty hand, so that he will lift you up in his own good time. Leave all your worries with him, because he cares for you. - 1 Peter 5:6-7