Why I do what I do:

Some Littles here at Shelterwood know from the day they arrive that they need to be here.  They become self-aware, they confront issues, make changes, of course there are still struggles and temptations, but in the end they come out stronger than they were when they came in.

Other Littles take a while to realize they need to be here.  They take each day as another day to be miserable and locked down.  Eventually, though, some of them come around.  It may be a phone call with their parents, or an encounter with God - something triggers a desire for change.

Still others stay miserable.  They maintain a mindset that they were sent away to hell and their primary goal is to make everyone else's lives hell until the day they finally get pulled from the program or kicked out.

There are a couple of guys who fit into that third category who all left the program around the same time for various reasons.  One of them is a little bit infamous around these parts.

Just a few hours ago, he posted the following on Shelterwood's Facebook page.  I know it's a bit lengthy, but it really is worth the read.
(Disclaimer:  This is unedited, except to remove specific information for privacy purposes)

"Why i was at shelterwood i thought it was hell and wanted to leave the whole time i was there. I had respect for almost no one there and fought every rule pretty much to the day i got pulled. I made a lot of great friends there and went through a lot of life changing things. I thought since day one of me being at "The Wood" that i should have never went there in the first place. I thought everyone else was in the wrong but me, and that i was just the victim in the situation.

Well now i've been home for around _ months and cann now honestly say i should have never left the program. I honestly never even gave shelterwood 1 single chance to change me, and i wish i had. I never really gave God a chance to change me there and i wish i had because now life is so much harder and not all its cracked up to be. I feel like shelterwood is what you make of it just like this kid "_____" said in his graduation. And from day 1 i made shelterwood hell and thats exactly what i got was hell.

While i was there i saw the kids who were graduating as a bunch of loser or kiss ups and if you really knew me i would of used completly different words than that. While i was there i met kids who faked there way through the program and you can easily tell they did based on there actions today. And everyday i wonder what my life would have been like if i stayed and made it completly through the program. I mean if you ask someone who is there now what was it like to know _____ while he was at shelterwood they would probley tell you ____ is a party all by him self or _____ treaeted people like s***. But those people that i treated like S*** and thought all i was is trouble are the people who really didnt know me. Im a loyal friend and if i tell you i got your back i always got it.

I wish i never left because the things that happened when i came home were not at all what i promised and promised and promised my mom would happen. So i guess the main reason i wrote this was to have some of the bigs who knew me and some of the littles who knew me just i know how hard it is at shelterwood. believe me. I was probley one of the worst littles to ever go threw that program and it kills me to say it but not graduating was probley one of the stupidest choices i have ever made because shelterwood was the perfect place for change and i just made the worst of it. i know some of my boyz from shelterwood will see this and be like wtf dude shelterwood was worthless and what i would say to yall... is that we never completly gave it a chance and if we did think of how much easier our lives would be today. i just am sorry for all the hell i gave evryone why i was there well alost everyone anyways bye i guess"

Even if we don't see it, God is working.
This is a kid that gave trouble to everyone all day every day.  But even he is still malleable in the hands of the Lord.  His time here was not a waste, but served to show him the potential he had for growth.

Even if we don't see it, God is working.
This is truth.

Messages like this are so reaffirming that what we do here is valuable.  That God will use us, even in our brokenness (or especially?), to inspire change and to set examples for people He so desperately wants to claim for His Kingdom, to release from bondage.

Be used.
And be encouraged that what you do, wherever you are, is not in vain.  We may not see the fruit, but God does.