In 1993, with a wife, three children and a heart for the Lord, Steve Graham accepted a job with the Union Mission as head of maintenance. It wasn’t just Steve who took on this ministry full steam ahead however, he brought along his side-kicks Dusty, Daniel and Jessica who started helping out.

Dusty, age 13 and Daniel, age 11 and Jessica, age 9 were mowing grass, weed eating, helping with donation pick-ups, flood relief and anything else that needed to be done. Steve had found his passion and was able to involve his family. His wife, Brenda, held many positions at the mission over a sixteen year span. In 1998, this dream started to fade and Steve began noticing that Dusty and Daniel were not around as much as they used to be. Their friends and the things they thought were important started pulling them away.

In 2004, Dusty found himself addicted to drugs and in jail. Daniel was also headed down the wrong path and sadly lost his life in an auto accident in May, 2006. The glimmer of hope that he left behind was his rededication at church on Christmas Day five months earlier. Just knowing that Jesus still held a place in his heart helped them cope with the loss.

Steve found himself wondering where it all went wrong. The boys he had raised in a good Christian home were suddenly gone. His fishing, hunting and working buddies chose a path he had never expected. “Empty… I felt empty when all this happened,” Steve said. Instead of wondering, he began praying.

For Dusty, jail was the best thing that ever happened to him, other than the Lord. It was there that he grieved the loss of his brother, missed out on the hunting trips and working with his dad, and realized how much he needed the Lord in his life. After being incarcerated and going to Teen Challenge, a faith-based rehabilitation program, the boy that was “incorrigible” came home a man who was on fire for the Lord.

In 2007, David Sneade asked Dusty to pray about coming on board at the mission once he completed the Teen Challenge program. With anxiety from both men, Dusty returned to the Union Mission, not as a volunteer, but as a chaplain at the Crossroads Men’s Shelter. He later moved and now works in the men’s Foundation program. Today, Steve and Dusty work side by side at
the mission helping others.

Growing up at the mission, Dusty was considered one of their own. “I knew that I was being prayed for daily. Daniel and I were the mission kids. When I came back, everyone welcomed me with open arms,” Dusty said.

For Steve and the mission, their prodigal son had returned! Both father and son were asked how it feels to be working together again? With tear filled eyes both reply, “good, it’s feels really good.”