A Story From Vineyard Missions USA
By Ruth (Vineyard India)
I have goosebumps as I write this, and I am trembling with emotion. As you know, we are a small church, but our great desire is to help the poor at this time. We have no support right now. And also, we have to observe the restrictions of this lockdown. I was down on my knees, crying out to God: “Father, tell me how to reach the poor and needy because we can’t even go out.”
I asked our domestic maid, who comes in for a few hours a day if she knew of anyone who needed help. We had enough money for a couple of bags of rice (amounting to around 50 kgs) and about ten kgs of dhal. Our domestic maid brought one single mother with no work, and we gave her ten kgs of rice and three kgs of dhal. Later more people began to come in – one at a time.
My helper Saraswati and I were giving out dhal, when we realized that the ten kg bag (which we had weighed twice) had yielded more than its weight. At night I crept down to the kitchen and used a different scale to weigh it while also checking on the regular scale. We had given three people three kgs each of dhal from a ten kg bag, and there were 4.8 kgs left! God multiplied the dhal! I knew He was giving me a sign that He wanted more to be fed, so we drew out more money from our rapidly depleting account and bought more rice and dhal. Without us even spreading the word, people came by as we prayed, and they were all in great need.
Yesterday we were down to one bag of rice weighing 25 kgs. We had given two people, ten kgs each and I told Saraswati that we had five kgs left, so if anyone came this morning, that’s what we would give them. I had also ordered more supplies. This morning, we were preparing to add five more kgs to the five kgs of rice that I mentioned we had left. The sack was on the weighing scale when Saraswati and I couldn’t believe our eyes. It was now ten kgs! God had doubled the portion!
We were speechless, tearful, silently witnessing His grace.
Today we opened more sacks as people came one by one, and all the while, we were aware that God was with us and that He had given us another sign that we were to go on giving to the people who showed up at our door. How grateful we are to Him! The best part is that our non-Christian part-time maid also got to witness these miracles, and her face was aglow with such reverence. Saraswati, who came to Jesus two years ago, was as overwhelmed and overjoyed as I was at the two miracles of multiplied rice and dhal. We could barely speak, and just stared at the sack of rice that last night weighed five kgs and this morning weighed double!
Our God never ceases to amaze us.
We have been getting food to people one at a time. They come to us during non-curfew hours. Today, I just wanted to share with you that even when we take just one small step in faith, God walks with us. We are so grateful to Him.
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