After leaving the U.S. Army, John Lunceford started driving a school bus for the Kennewick School District in Washington State. Anyone who’s been to the American Northwest knows that in the winter it gets cold. Very, very cold.
Early this winter John stopped the bus and a little boy climbed in from the freezing morning, but John noticed right away that something was wrong. The boy was crying softly, his head drooping down so low John could hardly recognize him. It turned out that he was incredibly cold and had no hat or gloves. John’s response? He instantly took off his own gloves and put them on the child’s hands.
After dropping all the kids off at school, John drove straight to the nearest store and bought ten pairs of gloves and ten hats. Then he went back to the school, asked an administrator to track down the boy, and once they found him, gave him one of the hats and pairs of gloves.
What an amazing feeling that must have given the boy: there’s nothing so warming in childhood as knowing that you’ve been seen and taken care of.
But that wasn’t enough for John: he then announced to the children in the school library that anyone who didn’t have gloves or a hat could get them from him.
He didn’t know why the little boy didn’t have warm things and he didn’t ask. “I’m a grandfather, you know,” Lunceford says. “No one wants a kid to suffer like that.”
Now John is prepared if a child gets on his bus without much-needed accessories, so none of his charges will have to cry through the freezing northern winter again. What a warm-hearted generous person!
It’s good to be reminded of how many guardian angels there are around us.
