The video is a collection of personal testimonies from residents, volunteers, and staff of the Harvest Center, illustrating how the organization provides immediate basic needs (water, warm coffee) and a supportive community that helps people transition out of homelessness. Speakers recount their own hardships—loss of jobs, death of loved ones, substance abuse, and living on cold cafeteria floors—followed by moments of connection with Harvest Center volunteers who offer encouragement, practical assistance, and classes. The Center’s guiding philosophy is described as “engage, relate, transform,” emphasizing relationship‑building before prescribing solutions. Specific stories highlight Marvin’s journey from a jobless, depressed individual to a road‑construction worker who regained self‑esteem through the Center’s training and compassionate environment, and Tranier’s experience of being welcomed, encouraged, and ultimately finding purpose. The narrative underscores the Center’s role in fostering dignity, community, and tangible outcomes such as re‑employment, improved mental health, and a sense of belonging, positioning the Harvest Center as a catalyst for personal transformation and neighborhood solidarity.
Chapters
I'm putting water on the tables, and the reason I'm putting water on the tables is when they come in off the streets, they are thirsty, and we have water for them. And that's the first thing they want when they walk in is water in the summer. And in the winter, the first thing they want is warm coffee.
They're, they're freezing cold, and so we have Marcy, she tells different stories about the Bible, and I've learned quite a bit from her. I live over there at the corner of Allegheny and Ashton. I got a tent in the woods. After my wife passed away, I just didn't care anymore. I just started doing my drugs and drinking and carrying on. Lost my job.
He is the neatest man. He's gentle, he's sweet, he's quiet, but when you begin to talk to him, you find there's so much depth.
Things in my home weren't the best. I was raised by my grandmother. My mother and father, they had I've been in the streets my whole life, basically. I went from being in a comfortable bed to sleeping on a cold cafeteria floor on a mat filled with people that I had never seen in my life, that didn't know me from a can of paint, that brought in with them what they, you know, learned from the streets. So we got roaches and, you know, crying babies and poop smeared on the bathroom walls and—
Poop?
Police being there because somebody's child has touched somebody else's child.
When I was homeless, I didn't have nowhere to go. My lowest point was the point where I had lost my job, I had lost the house. It's cold, it's empty, it's lonely, it's degrading. Everything goes away. Your self-esteem, your strength, your love. And then somebody was telling me, Marvin, we can help you get back on your feet in the Harvest Center. I didn't believe that. I was thinking that, oh, this stuff ain't gonna work. This is— this can't happen.
The Harvest Center is a place that builds community. It builds community that helps and serves those in need, but also those who may not be in need but are— who want to help other people. You know, the way we say it is that we engage, relate, and transform. Right, and, and the way we do that is we invite neighbors in who may be homeless, they may be poor, they may be unemployed, but we invite them into our space to build relationships with them, to get to know them, and to serve their needs. And in that, we see lives transformed. And that's what we do at the Harvest Center— transform lives.
She is such a light. I started just getting to know her, what her likes are. The Harvest Center has provided her a safe place to be herself, to be genuine, to do some authentic digging.
From the very beginning, she told me, you're strong, you're, you're gonna be somebody. And I would think, me? I thought that was crazy. I'm like, because I came in and I was so angry. I was so hurt, and I just felt so small.
A lot of times we see the homeless in our community as people who are hiding, or people who don't want to be seen, or don't want to be known, and yet they do. They want to be known, and that's where we, we call it relate. We get to know them, and we let them get to know us before we start to prescribe what they should do with their life and how to get their act together and all that. We treat them just like we would our neighbor. Marvin, you know, to go from being fired and then rehired by the same guy in less than a year because you're different, not because of a second chance, but because a whole new chance, because Marvin's a new man.
When I first saw Marvin there, I thought, he's scamming these people. That's what I first thought. I thought, this is another trick to get something for free. It's Marvin.
My job is I build roads, and my job title is when the machine goes put the asphalt down, I like smooth it out, make sure everything's beautiful. I'm the beautifier. I was not dependable. I was not focused on the job. My mindset wasn't right. So I wasn't 100%. So I said Harveston allowed me to be the person that I always wanted to be, you know, be responsible, be a man, teach me how to do things the right way. The love and compassion that they gave me and the classes that they gave me, I didn't think that that worked, but I really didn't have nothing to lose.
It's called Tiger Tail. It's my first time hearing about it, but you just, you tuck, you tuck the tail in their shorts and you just let them run wild and you just try to take each other's tails and you try to make sure that no one takes yours.
Tranier has been with us for about 3 months. Tranier's wonderful. She is a really sweet person. She's really reliable. She does not seem like someone that would have been homeless.
And I'm enjoying my life more now. It's just good feelings.
I don't think this is an act for Marvin. I think it's been a life-changing experience.
When I found the Harvest Center, I found me.
There's no word to describe What the Harvest Center has done for my life. And I talk about that all the time, that even being there at the shelter, if somebody would have told me, hey, you might be here in this place now, you might be crying on this hard mat on this cold floor, but in a year or two from now, you're going to meet a group of people that, by the grace of God, are going to love you. Diversity saved my life.
