The “Season of Giving” is Over, but as Hunger and Homelessness Continue – Assistance Still Needed
By Jeremy Reynalds, Senior Correspondent, ASSIST News Service (jeremyreynalds@gmail.com)
ALBUQUERQUE, NM (ANS -- Jan 7. 2017) -- For
about two months out of each year, the telephone at Joy Junction, New
Mexico’s largest emergency homeless shelter, rings almost off the hook
with calls from happy sounding voices offering food, volunteer help and
monetary gifts.
Our online giving portal at www.joyjunction.org is also busy, with concerned and kindhearted people wanting to make a donation.
As
you may have guessed, I’m talking about the Thanksgiving and Christmas
seasons. However, the need to take care of our city’s homeless is one
that is year round.
But
online giving makes a dramatic decline at 11.59 pm on new year’s eve,
and when the phone rings after the holidays it’s usually a desperate
family looking for help.
When
someone comes in the office, rather than volunteers coming to help,
many times in comes a sad and scared mom looking for a place to stay.
Other times it’s an embarrassed and humiliated dad having to swallow his
pride to make sure his wife and kids will find food and shelter until
he finds a permanent place to stay.
Tonight
and for days, weeks and months to come, Joy Junction will still shelter
families who without our assistance would have no roof over their
heads. Everyone we help is hurting in one way or another.
As
concerned and caring community members, we need to remember two
important facts. First, the homeless are with us year round, not only
during the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays.
Second,
with proper help, many of our guests, who have unique stories of quiet
desperation that most of us could never imagine in our worst nightmares,
can and do turn their lives around.
While
many of the homeless have made bad decisions in their lives, such as
getting involved with illegal drugs or abusing alcohol, who among us
hasn’t made a bad choice? It’s just that usually our choices aren’t as
obvious as those made by the homeless.
And
let’s face it. If you or I had been forced to contend with many of the
unspeakable circumstances experienced by the homeless, who’s to say we
wouldn’t make a similar choice?
Then
there are others, who maybe because of domestic violence or a difficult
economy, are just unable to make it without the assistance offered by
Joy Junction or other similar ministries.
A number of the homeless are also people who have served this nation in times of need.
According
to national surveys conducted in years past by Joy Junction and other
faith-based ministries around the United States, nearly one in three men
staying at homeless shelters is a veteran.
If
there’s one thing I’ve learned after working with New Mexico’s homeless
for 30 years, it is that with the right sort of help, many of them turn
their lives around.
Specifically,
rehabilitation requires not only mental and physical counseling, but
also spiritual nurturing to give these men and women the strength they
need to return to society. That’s what Joy Junction in particular – and
faith-based ministries in general – are all about.
This
nurturing of faith is the key to taking people off the streets, giving
them new lives and making them productive. Yet it must be done in a
sustained way. Just as the problems creating homelessness are not
“seasonal,” neither are the solutions.
The
homeless need an environment in which they are kindly and
compassionately challenged to acknowledge and quit unhealthy behaviors,
otherwise they will never acquire the practical or emotional skills they
need to succeed.
Establishing
responsibility and accepting a consistent faith in Jesus Christ is the
beginning of transforming a lifestyle learned on the streets to a safe
and successful life.
Those
of us who help Albuquerque’s homeless at Joy Junction do so because
it’s both the Biblical thing and the right thing to do. It is that
belief which gives us the strength to get out of bed every morning and
care for men and women who are ignored by many people in Albuquerque.
As
you go about your daily duties, please remember those in need. Even
though we are officially past the holiday season, please use this very
cold weather as a reminder to thank God for the blessings of your home
and as an opportunity to reach out to others who are not so fortunate.
Sometimes when people consider the overall homeless picture, they declare the situation to be hopeless.
For
Joy Junction, while helping the homeless is indeed difficult, with the
transforming power of the Christian faith, combined with your generosity
over the last 30-plus years, we are succeeding. We are ending
homelessness and hunger one life and one meal at a time.
So
with that in mind, I hope you will continue to remember us and others
in 2017 who give food, shelter and a message of hope and encouragement
to the homeless, hungry and discouraged. We’re making a difference.
Photo captions: 1) A homeless family. 2) Jeremy Reynalds greets a homeless man. 3) Jeremy Reynalds with his wife, Elma.
About the writer: Jeremy Reynalds,
who was born in Bournemouth, UK, is Senior Correspondent for the ASSIST
News Service, a freelance writer and also the founder and CEO of Joy
Junction, New Mexico's largest emergency homeless shelter, www.joyjunction.org.
He has a master's degree in communication from the University of New
Mexico, and a Ph.D. in intercultural education from Biola University in
Los Angeles. One of his more recent books is “From Destitute to Ph.D.”
Additional details on the book are available at www.myhomelessjourney.com. His latest book is "Two Hearts One Vision." It is available at www.twoheartsonevisionthebook.com. Reynalds lives in Albuquerque, New Mexico with his wife, Elma. For more information, please contact Jeremy Reynalds at jeremyreynalds@gmail.com.
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