Sometimes our partners feel vulnerable for their programs and their clients. Listen now to Sandra Nicholas, Director of Brunswick Street Mission, Halifax, Nova Scotia, who wonders what we’d all like to hear.

I feel concern when asked for stories that can help share our work and encourage support. Why? Because I think people only want to hear “success” stories.

Most days, our combined efforts make no measurable change in anyone’s lives. Sometimes we turn a life around — put a homeless person in their own home, help a person into the workforce to make a decent living, help someone beat drug addiction. As beautiful as these stories are, it’s the others that touch me deepest.

I mean stories of disaster, addiction, mental illness, debilitating and mortal diseases, bone-crushing poverty, despair, and enough anger to torch the world! We bear people’s tears, their anger, and their hopelessness. Most days, the best we achieve is to put a bit of food in a hungry mouth, a warm coat on a cold body, a moment of dignity in a humiliating day of panhandling, and a moment — painfully brief — when people know somebody cared.

It doesn’t make a “good” story, yet in our hearts we know it’s the most important thing we do. One soul after another believed somebody cared! Stories of success and change are real and special, but the stories I would rather tell are only small moments: a smile, a laugh, a tear of relief.

Every gift to the church’s mission and service is used wisely and helps transform lives. Please continue to give generously  - visit the M&S donation page.

Photo courtesy of Brunswick Street Mission.