We All Need a Little Help: An Escalating Crisis
It’s hard for me to believe that I am now fifty years old and celebrating more than a quarter century of continuous ministry to New Mexico’s homeless population.
I have first-hand knowledge of what being homeless is like because I was once homeless myself. I remember what it was like to crawl into an open storage shed for the night. I remember how good a bologna sandwich can taste when you’re famished. I remember how cold my thumb got from sticking it out in the freezing rain, trying to get someone to pick me up so I could travel the five miles–which might as well have been 500 miles–to a church that had offered to let me sleep on the floor for the night.
Some time after those experiences, which I now can see were God’s preparation for my calling, I began the Albuquerque-based Joy Junction in 1986. Prior to that, I worked with the homeless in Santa Fe from 1982 through 1986.
It’s been twenty-two years . . . and yet it seems like a short time ago that I came up the driveway of our 52- acre property wanting to reach out to homeless families with the love of Jesus Christ. The vision I had was for a refuge where the entire family unit could stay together at one of the most difficult times in their lives, a place where husbands and wives could offer support for one another. I also hoped that their children, while attending schools in the area, could live in as normal a situation as possible. I had no idea what adventures, struggles and trials would lie ahead or that there would be an increasing need for such a haven.
Tragically, more than twenty years later, there appear to be few faith-based homeless shelters around America that are devoted to offering assistance to the entire family in one place.
Perhaps the lack of facilities or resources is due to at least in part to the inherent difficulty of working with family units. Some of the problems that surface with families just don’t arrive when you’re dealing with individuals such as single men or women. The issues are more multilayered with families, but the need is just as great. My prayer is that the model and standards of care and assistance would adjust to the realities.
Meanwhile, I am disturbed at the increasing numbers of people whose circumstances force them to call Joy Junction home. The escalating number of homeless people is at crisis level in Albuquerque, and many in the community don’t seem to realize the seriousness of the situation. Five years ago, Joy Junction was feeding, sheltering and helping in a myriad of other ways about 150 people each night. Now we regularly help more than 300 people nightly, and that number shows no sign of diminishing.
With those numbers in mind, we have a vision for many more services to our residents. Among other things, we would like to start an onsite Christian school, provide an employment service and job counseling, offer GED training, and perhaps open a school of cosmetology. We would also like to renovate our onsite chapel and spruce up the other buildings and grounds.
Perhaps you’re asking yourself, “Why? Isn’t everything you’ve talked about just going to bring an influx of homeless people to Joy Junction?” (and other shelters nationwide).
My answer is this: No, because no one wants to be homeless. But as the costs of fuel, basic utilities, healthcare, and food continue to rise, more and more of us are being thrust into poverty and living on the brink of homelessness. The possibility becomes a probability–and then turns into a reality, and it is happening more and more often. What the resources I have talked about earlier will help us do is to cope more effectively with the influx of people whom we have every reason to expect will keep coming.
Maybe you’re saying, “Well, I wouldn’t ever get in that situation and if I did happen to come even close, I’d be out there pounding the pavements and taking care of my family’s needs.”
All right. But let’s say you couldn’t, for whatever the reason. Maybe the day you never thought would come actually has come. You awoke one morning feeling there was a heavy black cloud hanging over your head, and when you attempted to put your feet on the ground it was as if you were moving through a thick fog. You stepped unwillingly into the darkness of depression and you couldn’t find your way out. As a result, you didn’t go to work and you lost your job. Eventually you lost your house. You may have started drinking and perhaps ended up on the streets of Albuquerque or the city you live in.
If these events happened in Albuquerque, there’s a good chance you may have been directed to Joy Junction, where we would do our best to help you in any way we could or direct you to other organizations that would more directly address your needs. As you saw earlier, we’ve been doing this for more than two decades. Why? Because we’re increasingly convinced that everyone needs a little help sometimes.
Maybe your issue is not homelessness–it could be something else. No one, me included, can expect to walk through life without stumbling on a pothole or two on the road, and we all need help sometimes in getting back up. The upcoming book from which this article is excerpted, “We All Need a Little Help,” tells of how some fell, but it also tells of how someone helped them to walk again–maybe with scars, but with renewed strength through God’s grace. One of those people was me, and I’m here to affirm God’s amazing grace in rough circumstances.
Jeremy Reynalds, Ph.D. is Founder and CEO of Joy Junction, New Mexico’s largest homeless shelter. For more information go to www.joyjunction.org
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(Source: Christian Newswire)
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