A young boy insisted his mum bought a homeless man a meal and then sang grace with him, reducing the entire restaurant to tears.

Five-year-old Josiah Duncan was going to eat at a local Waffle House in Prattville, Alabama, when he spotted a homeless man sitting outside. Asking his mum, Ava Faulk, why the man didn't have a house or a family, he urged her to buy the man something to eat. "He didn't have any food," Josiah told WSFA 12.

"He came in and sat down, and nobody really waited on him," Faulk added. "So Josiah jumped up and asked him if he needed a menu because you can't order without one."

But before the man could eat his burger, Josiah went over to the man's table and began singing grace: "God our Father, God our Father, we thank you, we thank you, for our many blessings, for our many blessings, Amen, Amen."

"I wanted to say the blessing with him," he explained in an interview with the news station.

Fault said she and the homeless man both cried, as did the other onlookers in the restaurant. Josiah's actions are an example of how we should always look to treat other people, she added.

"You never know who the angel on Earth is, and when the opportunity comes you should never walk away from it."

In a further email to WSFA 12, Faulk said that Josiah's prayer "will be forever one of the greatest accomplishments as a parent I'll ever get to witness."