How could I pass her by?

"Excuse me, can you give me one dollar? I am hungry and I don't have money to buy food", the unkempt lady looked at me with wide, dazed eyes.

This is not the first time I have encountered ppl on the streets asking for money and my response these days is to offer them food instead of money. I would not want someone to take the money and buy themselves cigarettes or alcoholic drinks.

She replied,"Oh, I want to go somewhere there to buy rice." to which I replied, "It's okay. I will follow you there to buy you the food". And she pleaded again, "Please, I just need one dollar. Can you give me one dollar?" I knew then that she's not going to use the money to buy food and I said sorry and moved on.

As I was praying back home, I thought about the lady and realised how indifferent I was to her situation. Why didn't I spend a little more time talking to her? Yes, she is smelly and dirty and kept asking for that dollar but was not I like this once? Did not God pick me up and wash me and cleanse me when I was dirty and stinking with sin in my life? How could I let this person walked on in life without a saviour, without a friend and without hope?

My heart broke and I burst out in tears. This lady does not need another dollar!!! She needs the gospel and I failed to give her what she rightfully deserves. It is only a dollar! If my one dollar can be used as a means to spark a conversation that enables her to hear the good news of Jesus Christ, isn't that dollar worth it all? Even if she were to reject accepting Christ later and used that dollar for a puff, could not the seed that was planted in her heart bloom one day? Oh, how narrow I was and how shallow I am!!! I thought I had made the right choice by not giving her the dollar, but I did not make the best choice to give her the treasures in heaven. 

How could I pass her by? How could I when Christ did not pass me by? May the Lord have mercy on me and help me to stretch out my hands beyond my own comfort to a world of poor, dirty, smelly and dying souls.

"Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!!!" 1 Cor 9:16