One day when I was grocery shopping, I carried my purse in the cart I was pushing. It was open on the top rack of the cart. My wallet was perfectly visible in the purse, and I was carelessly turning my back on it to look at produce and other groceries. When I arrived at the check-out my wallet was gone. I did all the usual things, telling the manager, calling the police when I got home. The wallet contained all my credit cards as well as my social security card and driver’s license, in addition to about thirty dollars in cash. It also contained priceless photos of my grandchildren.

At home I began the dreaded process of canceling the credit cards, getting a replacement for my license and trying to understand how God could possibly have allowed such an egregious thing to happen to me. We had actually changed grocery stores because our previous one was notorious for thefts, and often had a guard on duty. I wondered how to pray. I hoped some sort of confrontation would come to the thief.

Finally, in my “quiet time” I remembered the thief on the cross next to Jesus , and I prayed for my thief to have a repentant heart. I felt a relief from the angst I was in, and continued to pray. It was still a hassle to get a new driver’s license, first a temporary one, and later a replacement, all the time wondering who would be using my identity next, and how.

A few weeks after these events I found in my mailbox a package from the post office. Inside was a notice explaining that the wallet in the package had been found in a mailbox in Carrollton, Texas, a town not far from us; and the Post Office had forwarded it to me. I was amazed , and quickly examined the wallet to find that nothing at all, except the cash, was missing! My license, credit cards, everything was intact, and there were my grandchildren’s pictures.

The thief’s words came back to me again:”We are punished justly, for we are getting what we deserve. But this man has done nothing wrong,” (Luke 23:41) “This man” was the Christ in his most distressing appearance. He it was that welcomed the second thief and spoke the words, “Truly I tell you; today you will be with me in paradise.”

( Luke 23:43) The men who both deserved to die, did not deserve to live with Christ after they died, but one of them received that new life.

I certainly didn’t deserve to have all my valuables returned to me, but by the grace of God at work in a thief, they were. I gained more in this experience than I lost.

Love in Him,

Prue