Different Faces of Homelessness

Anthony’s* journey with homelessness began with financial upheaval and has since been marked by chronic instability. Although he had work and some resources, poor credit prevented him from securing stable, long-term housing. His life was a cycle of sleeping in cars, renting rooms in motels, and crashing on couches with friends and others, leading to a pattern of homelessness that was difficult to break.

When Anthony came to Love INC, through a church partner and a personal relationship to someone connected with Love INC, Anthony found temporary housing. However, living on the streets for an extended period often leads to the development of poor habits that are difficult to break. Anthony faced difficulties in his shared housing because harmful behaviors he developed while living in the streets had a significant negative impact on others. And despite warnings about the need to change his behavior from his landlord, friends, and LINC MoCo, Anthony was unable to conform his behavior to the requirements imposed upon all of the residents. This ultimately led to him losing his housing and returning to the streets.

The landlord, concerned for Anthony’s well-being, struggled with the decision to evict him but ultimately had to uphold the rules as well as prioritize the health and safety of other tenants.

At LINC MoCo, we embrace redemptive compassion, which means recognizing that while we offer support, we do not excuse wrong actions nor interfere with the work God is doing in our neighbor’s life. We understand that helping others can sometimes lead to feelings of guilt or an overbearing sense of responsibility, and there may be a temptation to assume the role of their savior. To avoid these unhelpful and often harmful tendencies, we encourage landlords and others to uphold necessary consequences and decisions, such as standing by an eviction, and allow God to work in the lives of those in need.

To our surprise, Anthony later reached out with gratitude, expressing that he felt the nearness of God and joy in his life despite the setbacks. Yet, his journey wasn’t without ups and downs. On another day, in a conversation with Anthony, he was not seeing things as positively. As is common, his feelings fluctuated between gratitude and resentment, acceptance and entitlement. This highlights an important lesson: those in need are like us and can experience a range of emotions in the course of dealing with the consequences of their poor decisions and choices. Our role is to help them remain focused on the long-term goals and trust in God’s plan.

Significantly, Anthony has found temporary housing. In the meantime, he is working on finding long-term housing by improving his credit scores, developing personal and professional habits that will make him a desirable tenant, and expanding his network of key relationships in the church and community.