VIDALIA — Soon after a Vidalia youth pastor and his family left their home for a church conference in Atlanta last month, his sister called to inform him she found a stranger’s wallet lying on the ground in his garage.

Jamie Welch, youth pastor at the ChristLife River nondenominational ministry in Vidalia, said the news that some strange man had been snooping around his house while he was nearly 500 miles away angered him at first.

“My sister was helping take care of things and watch our dogs and called the next morning after we left,” he said. “She found a dude’s wallet right outside of my house, laying in the carport right beside my truck. He left his ID and everything.”

Troubled, Welch said he started to look for the man on social media and posted his picture.

After friends responded and shared the post, Welch said word quickly reached the owner of the wallet.

“He messaged me at first and said he and his girlfriend got in a fight while they were driving down the road and she threw it out of the window,” Welch said. “My truck was parked a long way away from the road, so I knew right away something was wrong with his story. I told him she must have a strong arm to throw it that far and asked for the truth.”

After some persuasion, the man set the record straight, Welch said.

“He finally messaged me back and said he was walking around one night, high and hungry,” Welch said. “He said he was trying to look inside my truck to grab whatever he could so he could sell it and buy food. When my dog went crazy in the backyard, he panicked and ran.”

Still upset, Welch said he checked with his sister and made sure nothing was missing around his house. Once it appeared nothing was missing, Welch said he started to think through the situation and saw an opportunity to change the man’s life.

Welch messaged him back.

“I said ‘Look, God must be on your side because if I was home I would have shot you. If I would have been there and killed you, where would you have gone?’” Welch said. “He told me, ‘Man, I wouldn’t have made it to heaven.’ That opened up a door for me to start talking to him.”

Welch said he didn’t press charges against the stranger and even attempted to arrange a face-to-face meeting with him so he could sit down with the same family whose house he had been trying to break into just days before.

“I let him know that we were praying for him,” Welch said. “I never pressed charges because he admitted to what he had done.”

Welch said the man’s mother eventually reached out to Welch on social media, too. Welch said she thanked him for what he did and for not pressing charges.

“She said he has been troubled for a while,” Welch said. “She said he does know God, and he did go to church when he was younger. … We’ve all made bad choices, and I’m just thankful that my choices didn’t have anywhere near the repercussions that his had. And I thank God I wasn’t home that night, because this could’ve ended very differently.”