Beauty in the Brokenness

Being unwanted, unloved, uncared for, forgotten by everybody, I think that is a much greater hunger, a much greater poverty than the person who has nothing to eat. Mother Teresa

Being at Joshua Station has presented the opportunity not only to learn of struggle and brokenness but of hope and beauty. Between social workers checking up on kids, and incarceration records keeping people from housing, there are people getting their first full-time "real" jobs, people finding hope in Christ and people having their case files closed. There is the laughter of the children as they play on the playground or as they race each other around the parking lot with their bikes. There are stuffed animals that are about 3 feet tall. There are fights and late night movies. There are family members and old JS families that visit.

Joshua Station is well not very stationary. There is always a ton of activities going on. There is women's fellowship, women's bible study, Kids club, VBS, teen group and then there are a fair amount of staff activities designed to help you think and grow spiritually like Street Psalms and Leading from Below. It is also hard to live in community and community and to be constantly surrounded by people.

A lot of being around the families and hanging out with the kids has caused me to really question incarnational ministry. I mean its great but how do you measure its successes or failures. How do you know if you are really making a difference? And maybe we can never know... but for now the answer is for me in the children's faces, and the women's' uplifted eyes.

"It is not the magnitude of our actions but the amount of love that is put into them that matters." Mother Teresa