In 2021, 580,466 people were homeless in the US. Of those half million people, seventy percent were individuals, while another 30 percent were families with children.
Although for a few years homelessness seemed to be on the decline, over the last three years it has started rising again.
Homeless people are not different from all of us and shouldn’t be treated as if they were. Most of them used to live happy family lives once. They had a job, maybe children, they had fun and they certainly didn’t expect to end up on the street one day.
But, you can never know what the future has in store for you, so some of them lost their jobs, lost their homes, or suffered psychologically, maybe even became addicted to drugs. From then on, it seemed that there was no turning back.
These background stories that we know nothing about it’s that we need to think of when we see homeless people on the street trying to fight the cold, or begging for help.
Most people, however, walk past them without even looking. Only a few spare a dollar for them, and even fewer try to actually cover an obvious need they have.
Like a man did a few weeks ago in Oklahoma City. The man’s random act of kindness was captured on camera, and he is now called a good samaritan.
In late January, Andrea Durbin Ward was driving near I-40 and McArthur, when she became the witness of an uncommon act of kindness.
Right in front of her, a man was driving his own car, when he suddenly stopped. There was nothing wrong with his car as someone may have guessed. Rather, he was just about to do the kindest thing ever.
The man got out of his car, and he walked to the median, where a homeless man was. The person who was standing there was shoeless. He was only wearing his socks, so he definitely looked like he could use a pair of shoes.
The man didn’t think twice. He took off his shoes and gave them to that stranger. Then, he returned to his car only in his socks.
“I would like to give a shout out this this man!! Got out of his car, took off his shoes and gave them to the homeless man in only socks,” wrote Ward in a Facebook post, accompanied by photos of the man’s kind gesture.
Ward then went on to wish the best to the stranger for his generosity.
“May God bless you today and always!! Made my day to be front row to something very cool.”
Ward’s Facebook friends loved the post and, most of all, they were touched by the man’s selflessness.
“Things like this give me hope. The fact that it’s a little cool when you got to see it makes my heart happy,” someone wrote.
Such stories certainly give us hope that there’s still good in people. We just need to open our eyes and see.
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