By: Marc McMahon

“Let us, therefore, come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in our time of need” Hebrews 4:16 NKJV. What a true statement that is. Also, let me tell you about an experience I had with God yesterday. Or universe, H.P., or the likes of. I simply choose the “G” word but personally I believe it is the same universal power of love that all those religions or gods end up at. Just a theory of mine I’m not ready to get into yet :).

Anyway, the day before yesterday my H.P. took the time to show me how the above verse would fit handily in my life and gave me a prime example to show me how. Kind of like a heavenly email with a thing-to-do list. It read if you when given the chance humble yourself before your obnoxious, drunken, still lives in a prison cell he still confuses as his apartment, neighbor of mine, whew (deep breath). You can find more grace in your time of need. I thought ok an email from God. Then wait, typed in the subject line was Humility Check! Oh, not so cool but the end result still is so maybe one-day :).

In doing so I am not conceding to his behavior and can still keep firm boundaries but if I do humble myself here on earth before my neighbor it will allow God mmm let’s say more room to work in my life. It opens the door a notch wider to God’s grace than maybe it was before the newfound humility showed up. Or like having the siren to the ambulance of grace turned on two blocks sooner than maybe it would have been prior. It simply saves our reward in heaven because we did not use it here on earth to look good in front of man. ( Matthew 6:1 – If You Seek Man’s Reward, There Is No Reward For You From God … If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.)

Yesterday

It started at Mcdonald’s at 5:30 am. I finished my breakfast and was leaving with my leftover biscuit, pancakes, and strawberry jelly and started to walk across the parking lot to the bus stop when I instantly, without thought really, turned around and walked into the Mcdonald’s to offer my leftovers to the homeless guy I noticed out of the corner of my eye when I was leaving. He accepted with nothing more than a wink from a wrinkled eye and I proceeded to the bus stop.

While waiting for the bus I was of course befriended by another homeless man who was so excited to tell me about how high he was on meth and that his wife was a ….. and blah, blah. I replied with awesome! I haven’t smoked that shit in nearly a year and my life rocks, no more homelessness! His tone immediately changed as I watched literal foot get crammed into his mouth. The tone changed to one of him being bummed, imagine that, no more joy.

But, me being me, or me being the new and improved me of today checked my pockets and came up with $2.60 to give the man, and guess what? Yep, joy returned, gosh she is a lovely lady that Joy is she not? On the bus home, I realized I had just given away my last dimes, literally for the month but no biggy that’s just what I do sometimes out of the blue not sure why but it’s cool. And because it is paying it forward, showing love, giving hope, and is almost always going to put a much-needed smile on some homeless person’s face.

Enter My H.P.

When I got off the bus and back to my apartment having forgotten already about those events I made coffee and sat down at my computer to find another email. God is so good, it is for a writing job for a law firm in Portland Oregon and they wanted an article written with a couple of links added to them and it published. So I did the legwork checked the firm out thoroughly and deemed them safe and agreed.

With the modern convenience of PayPal business, I wrote the article, published it, and an hour and fifty-seven minutes later I received the $100 payment we agreed on. Not a bad 2 hours of work huh? No longer broke, amazing grace, unmerited favor, thank you, Jesus! Would the email have been there if I had not helped out those two and followed my heart, who knows but I do know this. It was my heart that led me to do that because my stomach had a date with that biscuit :). Have a great week you all this is enough out of me for a couple of days I think, thank you all so much I love you.

About the Author: Marc is a 48-year-old Author, Speaker, and Soldier in a war to loosen the grasp that Substance Abuse has on our society. He is a Father, Son, and friend to all those seeking refuge from this incorrigible disease. Marc resides in the beautiful Pacific Northwest where he enjoys, writing, hiking, and kicking the disease of addiction in the teeth, every chance he gets. As Marc always likes to say, “be blessed, my friends!”