Jessica Reaves was shopping at her local grocery store back in 2013, when she suddenly noticed her wallet was gone. The mother of four and leader of a Christian outreach team at her church in Guthrie, Oklahoma, suspected that a man who had been standing closely behind her, was responsible for stealing her wallet.
But instead of running to the store’s security or calling police, Jessica did something completely unexpected, which since went viral. Jessica approached the thief and confronted him.
“I’m gonna give you a choice,” she told him. “You can either give me my wallet and I’ll forgive you right now, and I’ll even take you to the front and pay for your groceries.” Or, she would call police.
“He reached in his pocket and gave it back to me,” she told The Huffington Post, adding that “he started crying as we walked to the front. He kept apologizing and saying that he was embarrassed.”
They went to the checkout counter and as fate would have it, the groceries he had came to $27 – just the amount of money Jessica had in her wallet.
“I never carry cash. When I got to the check-out counter that day his (robber’s) total was just a little over $27 and I had $28 in cash in my wallet. And so I knew in that moment it wasn’t me. It was Christ that played in that moment,” she told Christian Post.
The man revealed that he would never forget what she did telling her “‘I’m broke, I have kids, I’m embarrassed and I’m sorry.’”
Jessica said she was prompted to do what she did by a scripture that she thought of. “As I saw him, a scripture came to me from Luke, which basically says ‘If someone should take your cloak, you should give them your shirt as well,’’ she said.
Check out Jessica’s interview below and share what she did with your family and friends.
Disclosure: This post may include affiliate links.