Free Stranger's Gift by Anna Schmidt

friend. “And I do? We’re swamped now, and Dad tells me there are at least three more church teams on their way here from surrounding areas. They’ll be here by suppertime. I need to make sure they’re fed and have a place to stay. There are the food boxes that must be delivered, Grady, and John Steiner—”
    Grady grimaced. “Remains a priority.”
    â€œWhy?” Hester could not disguise the childish petulance that flavored her response.
    â€œIt’s politics,” Grady replied with a long-suffering sigh. Hester knew that Grady was familiar with her lack of patience when it came to the political gamesmanship so common in his world. “Come on, Hester, help me out here. Put the guy to work on one of your teams just until I can get things fully organized at my end.”
    â€œHe only has one good arm,” Hester pointed out.
    â€œSo let him serve meals or hand out bottled water. That only takes one good arm.”
    As if he would agree to such menial labor
, Hester thought. He was clearly a man used to being in charge, although she doubted very much that he inspired others to work for him. But then suddenly she thought of something Arlen had said to John:
“Perhaps you weren’t listening.”
    Was it possible that God had deliberately set this cantankerous man squarely in her path to test her while obstructing her ability to relieve the suffering of more deserving souls? Was it possible that John Steiner was some sort of challenge the Lord had placed before her? Perhaps to show her that He was in charge, not her? To test her willingness to take direction—God’s direction—rather than go her own way as her father had noted earlier?
    Certainly in all the time she had been volunteering with MCC, this wasn’t the first time she’d seen a person respond with anger and affront at loss or tragedy. Instead of accepting the outstretched hands of those who wanted to help, such people would push past their rescuers determined to go it alone. More often than not they would fail and only add to their loss and misery. With God’s help they would sometimes return, emotional hat in hand so to speak, and ask for the help they had rejected in the first place. Hester studied John as he stood outside the Red Cross tent now with his legs widespread as if balancing on a ship’s deck. He appeared to be surveying the activity around him. Everything about his posture commanded others to stay out of his way. But when she looked at his face, she saw uncertainty and just the slightest touch of defeat.
    All right, Lord, I will see him through this, for now. I don’t understand why You have chosen this path for me to follow, but follow it I will
.
    â€œLend me your cell phone,” she said, holding her hand out to Grady.
    â€œNot great service,” he warned. “Who are you calling?”
    â€œNot me,” Hester said as she started across the parking lot. “He should call his aunt and let her know he’s alive.”

    John felt disoriented. It wasn’t just the pain medication the Red Cross medic had given him. It was as if he had stepped into a nightmare. The wreckage of his property haunted him, coming back to him in such vivid detail that it took his breath away. As the helicopter had turned north toward the hospital farther up the coast, John had sat speechless staring down at the surreal scene below. He’d spotted bits and pieces of his life cast away among the downed trees and crushed shrubs. In one stripped tree hung a shirt of his, whipped by the breeze until it resembled a flag. And was that his red metal toolbox half buried in the muck of the bay? The packinghouse was useless until he could get the wall and roof repaired, and his own home was equally uninhabitable.
    The evacuation chopper had airlifted him to the hospital, where Hester had filled the emergency room personnel in on the situation. Arlen and Samuel had met them