November 2024 Prayer Update
We held our first ever mission business forum in Valparaiso Indiana. It was a great day to encourage and challenge ministry and business leaders on how they can make disciples through Kingdom enterprise! We had 20 believers spend most of a Saturday learning from each other as the Lord guided our discussion and showed us some new ways to think about how He can use our businesses and workplaces to reach others with the Gospel. Big thanks to Joe Drew and Tim Bock who helped lead the day and facilitate the discussion. We are hoping to bring it back to Valparaiso again next year, so please let us know if you are interested in attending!
Our Chillicothe Helping Hands Resale Shoppe held our annual Christmas Open house. This year we were sharing the funds from the week with our local Community Needs Agency to specifically purchase winter coats for kids in our area who needed one. We had an amazing turnout, as you can see from the pictures. We had a huge line of people waiting to get in and find that perfect item. They waited in the rain and cold, but didn’t mind at all. It is so much fun to see our community utilize Helping Hands as a way to serve others and get some great deals on items that are for sale. This continues to be our largest day and as a result our largest week each year in proceeds that we are able to share with the community and to help fund local ministry. Our managers and volunteer are simply amazing and they put in tons of hours to get the open house ready!
We have decided that the best way for us to multiply the results of our resale ministry is to start coaching other charitable organizations on how to begin and run their own community charity resale shop. Our resale director Matt Ashcraft has worked for over a year to create a training process to help others start their own shops using our model. We are just beginning to coach Daniel Bean with Pathway of Hope as they start their own resale shop in the Washington/Sunnyland area of central Illinois. Please pray for all of us as we come alongside them in their effort to serve their local community and missions around the world!