"The fire of suffering brings forth the gold of godliness."

My inspiration today comes from the man who sells newspapers near my house, on the corner of Highway 1764 and Interstate 45. Until today, I had never talked to him, but he's always there regardless of weather conditions, waving and smiling at every single car that goes by. Nothing seems to break his spirit - EVER. I'm going to be extremely presumptuous here, but my guess is that the man probably doesn't have much money and he probably doesn't make much selling newspapers. He does, however, have this inner joy that you just can't miss.
This morning, I bought a newspaper from him, and when I asked how he was doing, he simply said, "I'm blessed, maam. Truly blessed."
It was kind of like this friendly reminder that although our society uses monetary worth as a measure of personal worth, money isn't everything after all.
I don't know this man at all, but the impression that I get is that he's extremely spiritual. And I love the thought that at the end of this short lifetime, regardless of what he lacked in material things here, he'll go to Heaven for eternity and have everything he needs forever.
I can't help wishing he would win the lottery in the meantime...
But what a neat man he seemed to be.