Pastor Wilfredo de Jesús had been teaching his congregation “to honor people, ordinary people who just work hard.” He challenged the members of New Life Covenant Church in Chicago’s Humboldt Park to recognize and honor the people in their everyday lives—the people who serve others, in ways big and small.
All of them are God’s children, he emphasized, and all deserve to be shown love and appreciation.
How One Man Changed a Woman’s Life Through Pizza Delivery
To drive home his message, he decided to teach churchgoers by example. That’s why, one blustery Sunday, during a church service, Pastor Wilfredo ordered a pizza.
Monique Hall was working that morning when the pizza joint got the call. When the order was ready, she drove it over to New Life Covenant Church. As she walked into the building, she was caught off guard when the pastor asked her, in front of the large congregation, to come up to the front. “I was nervous,” Hall said, according to WGNTV. “I did not understand why so many people had stood up for a pizza delivery person.”
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The pastor told her, “This is how we honor people.” He thanked Hall for delivering the pizza and explained the mission of the church. Then, Pastor Wilfredo turned to his congregation.
“We don’t know her story,” he said. “We don’t know what she’s going through, and maybe this was a prayer, an answered prayer.”
That’s when Hall got teary-eyed. “I got two kids. I’m a single parent. I’m just trying to do my best.”
The Tip That Changed a Life
Pastor Wilfredo asked Hall how much people usually tipped her. She said five dollars; the pastor pulled an envelope out of his pocket and proceeded to tip her $100. But he wasn’t finished yet. He then called upon the congregation to honor Hall as well.
He asked for ten volunteers to come to the front and tip her. He started counting members as they stood up: ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen. As the pastor looked around the church, members continued to stand and walk down the aisle, leaving money on the table in front of Hall and also giving her a word of encouragement and thanks or a friendly squeeze on the arm.
“I felt so loved by them,” Hall said. “All I could do was cry.”
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The pastor stopped counting, but members of the congregation didn’t stop from standing and walking down to the front of the church to honor Hall. Finally, Pastor Wilfredo called for a basket to put all the money in. He also gave Hall a Bible and a gift bag and told her that she was always welcome in their community. But there was one more important message that he wanted to stress to Hall.
“It could have been any other restaurant. It could have been any other delivery person. But it was you.” Pastor Wilfredo wanted her to know that the circumstances that had brought her to them that morning were anything but random and that she deserved to be appreciated and honored. All of this was meant for her.
How One Woman Paid It Forward
Hall left the church feeling so blessed that she decided to pay it forward and share that blessing with others. She shared the tips she received with her coworkers.
“I felt like some of my coworkers were just the same as me, in the same place,” explained Hall. “So it was only right that I give to them, since I was given to.”
A video of Hall’s experience made it to Facebook where it received over 86,000 likes, 14,000 comments, and close to seven million views.
One commenter on the post wrote, “During civil crises, people will ask, ‘Where is the church?’ Well! Here it is!”
Another chimed in, “That’s what being a true Christian is all about!”
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Many people commended the church for its gesture, for spreading love, and for being a blessing in its community. They applauded the pastor for his example of how to live a generous and abundant life.
Monique Hall’s life—indeed, the lives of all the people in the congregation that Sunday—will never be the same. Not because of the financial gift that Hall received, but for the unforgettable and unexpected act of kindness that was shown to her that day. Because people were generous to her, Hall was able to be generous to others.
Even people who only watched the video on Facebook commented on how the act of generosity impacted their lives. One said, as he watched the video, he first felt a twinge of jealousy and wondered why these sorts of things didn’t happen to him. But by the end of the video, he was inspired to create these sorts of acts in the world around him—to do something like this for someone else rather than sit around and hope it happened it him.
And that’s the true power of kindness and generosity in the world. It multiplies itself exponentially.
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