This morning in Deweyville, while I was filling up my boat, a man approached me. His face carried the kind of weariness you can’t fake — the weight of too many losses, too many storms weathered.

He asked me quietly if it was time yet, if he could finally go back home. My heart sank as I told him no.

His shoulders dropped. His eyes dimmed. And then, almost as if he couldn’t hold it in any longer, he told me what weighed on him most. This wasn’t the first time he had lost everything. It was the second.

The first loss had been devastating, but somehow he had managed to start over. This time, though, he said it felt different. He had already lost possessions, memories, the place he called home. Now, the only thing he felt he had left to lose were his daughters — and that fear haunted him more than anything else.

Right now, he’s living in his truck. But here’s what struck me: he wasn’t asking for pity. He wasn’t asking for money. He wasn’t even asking for help. He was asking for work.

He’s a welder by trade, with his own truck and machines. Skilled in both aluminum and steel. All he wanted was a chance to earn, to provide, to hold on to what really mattered. His pride wasn’t in what he had lost — it was in the work of his own two hands, and in the determination not to give up.

I’m no expert in welding, but I recognized something powerful in that moment: resilience. The kind of grit that keeps a man moving forward when everything around him crumbles.

One of my fellow officers was standing nearby and, without me knowing, took a candid photo. Later, he sent it to me. It shows me with my head bowed, hand resting on the man’s shoulder, praying with him right there at the gas station.

When I look at that photo now, it reminds me of what matters most. We can’t fix every broken house. We can’t replace every lost belonging. But we can stand beside each other. We can pray together. We can believe for each other when faith feels too heavy to carry alone.

The man told me he had been raised in the church. But he admitted his faith was being tested, stretched thin by wave after wave of hardship. And honestly, who could blame him?

So I ask you all — do for him what I tried to do in that moment. Keep him in your prayers. And not just him, but everyone fighting battles we can’t see, everyone living out of cars, everyone trying to rebuild piece by piece.

Because while homes can be lost twice, while jobs can disappear, while faith can waver — prayer, compassion, and community can remind us that none of us are ever truly alone.