Lottery player wins big after refusing to take dropped $100 bill. ‘Test from God’
When a New Jersey man made a quick stop at a store to buy lottery tickets, he said he unexpectedly faced “a test from God.”
The man was at a Phillipsburg convenience store on April 30 when he “spotted a $100 bill on the store’s counter,” New Jersey Lottery officials said in a May 12 news release.
“I see it, and I turn around,” he said in the release.
He noticed a customer at an ATM and two more in line, the man told lottery officials.
“I said ‘Did somebody leave this here?’” the man said, but there was no response.
Others in the store were telling him to “just keep it,” but it didn’t sit right with him, the man told lottery officials.
“I feel that if you take something that’s not yours, you will never get your own,” the man said. “And everybody there just looked at me like I was nuts.”
The man asked the store for an envelope to place the bill in lost and found, lottery officials said.
The clerk obliged, then sold him three Power 20X tickets for $20 each, “along with a healthy dose of good karma,” lottery officials said.
Upon scanning his ticket at the store, the player realized “something special was afoot,” according to lottery officials.
“I thought the ticket wasn’t activated, but the clerk said ‘you have the golden ticket,’” the player said.
Turns out, one of his tickets came with a $1 million prize, lottery officials said.
“I started crying and shaking,” the winner said.
Had he taken the $100 bill, the man told lottery officials, it would have made him feel guilty, and he would have left the store without a ticket.
“I just truly believe it was a test from God,” he said in the release.
The player told lottery officials he plans to spend his winnings on “a modest house and a reliable car — something that had been unobtainable before.”
Phillipsburg is about a 60-mile drive west from Newark.
This story was originally published May 12, 2025 at 3:51 PM with the headline "Lottery player wins big after refusing to take dropped $100 bill. ‘Test from God’."
