Tag Archives: Laundry Love Project

A Conversation at Laundry Love

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A volunteer had a blessed experience with one of the patrons at last month’s LLP event and wanted to share his touching story:

She had the loudest and brightest hijab in the Laundromat. She was also young and smiled more than the other Muslim women. Her husband was tall and large. I spoke to her husband first and helped him start the washing machines when they were ready. He said he needed to go to work and that his wife would do the drying. An hour later she flagged me down to start a series of dryers for her with my magic laundry card. Like her husband, she was noticeably grateful for the free help. Since we had made eye contact several times this morning, I asked her how she was doing.
“Fine. Very well. Thank you much.”
“Where are you from?” She said she was from Sudan. Not South Sudan—Sudan.

“Oh really? We supported South Sudan’s independence last year.”
“But it is terrible in the North” she said, as her engaging smile disappeared.
For the next ten minutes she relayed how she had been threatened and tortured by the Sudanese government.

Just then someone poked my arm, needing me to start their dryer. This conversation was too intense to drop. I handed them the magic card and asked them to bring it back. They did.

“Why were you tortured by your government?”
“Not the government. The security forces. They tortured me because I went to Darfur to help the people.” 
“Are you from Darfur?”
“No! I tell you already, I am from Sudan. Because my training is medicine, I go to Darfur to help people. The man who runs my government, he burns entire villages in Darfur. I go to help them.” 
“And they tortured you for providing relief?”
“Yes. They tortured me five times. And they make me to have sex.” 
“What??! Are you saying they raped you because you provided relief to Darfur refugees??”

She nodded her head resolutely. The certainty of her answer and the surprising lack of anguish or shame on her face confirmed the validity of the reports that I’ve read—that rape is a primary tactic used by governments, tribes and clans in African countries. One in four African women is a victim of political or tribal-motivated rape.
“The last time, they say the next time they come, they will kill me. That’s when I go to American embassy and ask for asylum. They give me permission to come to USA as Visitor. Then I can get work permit, then Green Card. This is my home now. I want to stay here.”

Another request to start a dryer. I handed someone my card without breaking eye-contact with my guest. We talked a little more about how her life in America is freer and safer, and how she is finding community among other Sudanese and African immigrants. Her smile returned and I could see she was genuinely thankful to have a new life here where she and her husband and her newborn child could live in safety.

But this was too emotional to just discuss and then leave hanging. God has us at this Laundromat today for a reason. There is something this woman needs that God wants to give her.

“Can I pray for you?” I asked.
“Yes, of course” she said as she smiled, assuming that I wanted to pray for her in the privacy of my home.
“I would like to pray for you right now.”
“Oh!” she said, her head pulling back and her hand blocking her heart, “But I am Muslim.”

–Quick, brain: Think of something.–

“That’s wonderful” I said, watching her face to see how she would react to what I was about to say next.
“You know that Koran says much about Isa” (Arabic for “Jesus”).
“Yes” she nodded.
“And the Koran says that Jesus blesses people, doesn’t it?”
“Yes, yes” she agreed.
“And if I pray to Jesus and ask him to bless you and your family in his name, he will bless your family, correct?”
“Yes, yes!” she said with a growing eagerness.
“Then let’s pray!” I smiled.
“Okay” she agreed, not really knowing what to do.

I closed my eyes and thanked Jesus for protecting her life and for bringing her family safely here. I asked him to heal the wounds and scars of the past—I could hear her agreeing out loud with this—and to bless her new life here as well as her husband and their newborn child.

“In Jesus’ name, Amen.”

I looked up and she was standing there with a thankful look on her face. I know Muslim women aren’t supposed to touch men who aren’t their husbands, but the moment came over me and I told her that I wanted to give her a hug, to which she complied. I told her to let us know if she had any other needs in case we could help.

Then it was on to the next washing machine.

I have no idea what she will tell her husband tonight.
I have no idea what it must feel like to be prayed for by someone else, maybe for the first time in your life.
All I know is that I was obedient and took the chance I’ve been hoping for. The rest is up to God.

Perhaps we’ll see her next month.

Why we do laundry for free:

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We at LLP Irving were not aware of the story of this family until is was published at Irving Bible Church’s monthly newletter.  Reading a story like this not only was encouraging to us as a ministry but it reminds us of why we are here as a ministry.  Praise the Lord!

A STORY FROM PROPEL

After their first encounter with IBC through Laundry Love, Kendra and Raymond Brookins found a place to belong at Propel.

“I was nine months pregnant, miserable and still going to the Propel classes because I loved being there that much,” Kendra Brookins says with a smile on her face.

The Brookins family — Raymond, his wife Kendra, and 4-year-old daughter Savannah — moved from Kendra’s home state of Oregon in 2010 to Texas. Not knowing anyone, they wanted to find a home church and a place to belong instead of just attending a Sunday service once a week.

The couple had tried different churches in the Dallas area but didn’t feel like any were where God wanted their family and faith to grow. After hearing about IBC while doing laundry one afternoon, Kendra and Raymond decide to see what IBC was all about.

Laundry Love, an IBC ministry begun in April of 2011, offers free cleaning supplies and laundry cycles at Amigo Laundromat in Irving.

“We were broke; I mean 2 to 5 dollars for laundry at the time was a lot, and this family just helped with my laundry and talked to me the entire time about IBC,” Kendra says.  It wasn’t long after this they began visiting the church on Sunday.

“Everyone seemed really nice and inviting here from the moment we walked in the door,” says Raymond.

But after joining IBC over a year ago, Kendra and Raymond were still looking for a place to belong. They didn’t want to just go to Sunday service every week; they wanted to be a part of the community, and had heard about Propel a few times through Sunday services and Chatter.

“Since we didn’t know anybody at IBC, we thought this was the best way to start,” Raymond says.

During the four-week class, Raymond and Kendra enjoyed listening to the pastors that spoke each week. “I really liked it because they had different perspectives,” Raymond says.

But it was one story that stood out to Raymond the most during the second class they attended. “This pastor told about how he thought he would never be a person who would preach a sermon — or anything like that,” Raymond says. Raymond connected with the speaker’s struggle because of his own struggles in life with his faith.

Since the class has ended, the Brookins family welcomed a new baby girl, Annabelle, born June 15. Kendra says while she was home with her newborn, Raymond would tell her how people from Propel would ask about how she and the baby were doing, which meant so much to her.

Now back in the swing of things, Kendra and Raymond are ready to dive in to IBC. And now, thanks to Propel, they have a list of groups and programs that could be a good fit for their family, as well as new friends and ministry connections.

“It’s kind of exciting because we can get involved. My daughter’s class got a letter today stating they need more help in the children’s ministry,” Kendra says, with a twinkle in her eye.

Raymond shares that the biggest reason he wanted his family to be involved with IBC is because of his own upbringing. His mother had his family involved in every part of his childhood church, an experience that gave Raymond his best memories with his family. He wants the same thing for his daughters, and now it seems possible.

“Now we come to church and we don’t just sit every Sunday. We see
people we know from class and feel like we are a part of the IBC community,” Kendra says.

And the IBC community is better for it. Welcome, Kendra and Raymond.

June’s LLP Event

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June’s event was somewhat calming and went by very smoothly.  The community kind of helped make it that way by having their loads ready early and once 9am comes around, we just slide in our cards and every single washing machine is on its way.  With no vacant washing machines left, that enables us to focus on getting to know our patrons better for the next 30 minutes until it’s time to transition to the dryers.  It was a valuable time for us to build relationships, tell each other’s stories and share God’s love.

We met several people who are going through struggles with their lives, and were able to provide financial assistance with their laundry, encouragement, prayer, and especially hope.  Even our friend “T” who we met here at an LLP event came by to help out.  Unfortunately he received a ticket on his walk to the event for jaywalking of all things!

We met 2 new volunteers from our church and were very glad that they came – they also helped make the event go by smoothly.  We gather together before each event to give thanks for this opportunity and for His guidance, and for open hearts and minds:

Here is our leader “A” showing our new volunteers “D”, “G” & his daughter “S” the ropes of how the laundromat machines work:

The down time while the washing machines were running allowed us to love on the patrons:

As always at each event, it is so delighting that the kids get to be involved and serve:

Since we didn’t have any action shots of our very own Mr. T, we figured we’d show 4 this time around:

Looks like someone was worn out from the fun:

Overall it was a fun and positive experience.  We will definitely pray for those who we met that are struggling and hope to see them at our Life after Laundry so that we can do life together!  Thanks to everyone for making this event a successful one!

June 2nd: Next Laundry Love Project

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School is out for Summer!  Let the 100-degree days begin…  Nothing better to kick the summer off than serving the local Irving community and getting those clothes clean!

A lot of great things have happened since the last LLP event.  Our church, Irving Bible Church asked us to be a part of a Ministry gathering where a bunch of ministries had booths where the church members could walk up to and gather information about each ministry.   Through this we were able talk to some members that didnt even hear about this ministry and some were also interested in volunteering!

The last month of our Life After Laundry has been interesting too.  None of the weeks were consistent, but God provided clear direction each week of what we needed to do, from folding laundry one week for one of our regular LLP patrons, “A” , then the following week hosting a bible study with “A” and her sister “J”, followed by another study with a totally new group of people, then followed with a night of prayer for our dear LLP friends “T” and his mother “V” (who is moving to Florida).

We started a new thing last month called LLPirving’s “VERSE OF THE MONTH”.  Check out this month’s verse:

 

Due to a large amount of Hispanics in the area, we also decided to put together a Spanish version (still working on translating the title):

Here is the info for this month’s event: 

Time:  9am – noon (or whenever allocated funds for the month is spent)
Where: Amigo Laundry
3349 Country Club Drive W, Irving, TX


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If you plan on doing laundry that day, please swing by for up to 3 loads of laundry free – no strings attached (we are there to serve).  We also provide free laundry supplies, refreshments, and children activities.

If you would like to make a donation or sign up to volunteer, please click on links above.

We look forward to seeing you all there!

Life After Laundry – Update

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The first month’s meetings of Life after Laundry were pretty uneventful.  It was just the two of us (“T” and “E”).  We knew God wanted us to have a bible study for the community, but were unsure on the finer details (ie. which day, what time, how to get the word of the study out to the surrounding community). So we spent the first meeting sessions praying for God’s direction with this study.

On May 9th’s session, we hung up posters on the bulletin boards that the owner of the laundromat installed for us to use for advertising for our ministry and bible study.  However, instead of advertising for our ministry (since we have no problem getting word out by mouth) along with our bible study poster, we installed the LLP Verse of the Month:

We prayed that those in the community who don’t know Jesus would at least see this poster for a glimpse of His Word and get hope or encouragement, and maybe plant that seed of seeking God through our study.

We then made our regular visit to see “V” and “T”.  ”V” was struggling with finding work and with her lease ending at the end of the month, she decided that it was time to move out of state and back to Florida where her daughter lives.  We asked about her son “T”, but she didn’t know his whereabouts and we could sense that there was concern for his well-being.  We told “V” that we would stop by next week and drop off some boxes for her belongings.

Upon arrival back to the laundromat, “T” wanted to take pictures of our newly hung posters, since he initially forgot to do so as soon as we had hung it up.  This is where God stepped in for this study:  While “T” was taking pictures, “E” stumbled upon one of our regular patrons “A” doing laundry and folding clothes – a month’s worth of clothes.  So we ended the night helping “A” fold clothes and getting to know her more.  We also had the opportunity to inform her of our study and invite her to join us next week.  She was open to that and told us she would be there with friends!

Well, on May 16th’s session we walked in the laundromat, and we noticed the posters were missing from the bulletin boards.  We initially thought they were removed due to complaints from the patrons of the laundromat.  Also we didn’t see “A” at the laundromat either.  We were trying not to be discouraged.

But the manager came to us and told us that the posters had just fallen down – supposedly the thumbtacks doesn’t grasp to the board well.  What a relief!  So we got a ladder and started re-hanging the posters.  Once we hung the last poster up, there was “A”, her sister “J” and 4 of their children standing there looking at us – fashionably late, but we were happy to see them!

We immediately started eating dinner together and kicked off our first official lesson.  We spent about 30 minutes in discussion and prayer!  We pray to see them again this coming Wednesday.

After our study, we headed over the “V” and “T” place again and this time we got to see both of them.  We dropped off some boxes for “V”‘s move and held hands and prayed for both of them – “V” for her move and “T” for his personal issues that he is going through.  We reminded them of the study we are having and “T” is going to make a concerted effort to be there this time around.  We have “V” cell phone # so we will make sure to remind them this time.

So far May has been a great month for Life After Laundry.  There is still lots of work and prayer to go in building this sub-ministry, but with God leading the way, anything is possible.

May LLP Event

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May’s event could be summed up in one word:  Quick.  The word on the street about this ministry has gotten out so much that people are coming up with creative ways to ensure that they are served by LLP during our event.  The Amigo Laundromat opens at 8am and we don’t begin the event until 9am, and usually people will be waiting in a line for us.  Now people are now coming in early and loading their washers and then waiting until 9am to be served.  Almost all washers were loaded up, and when 9am came around we were just inserted cards to every washer.  In a way that was great since all washers were running at the same time and allowed us to build relationships with people, but on the flip side there were people coming in after 9am and were forced to wait.  We’ve actually been told by some people that they refuse to show up during our events because they come in and have to wait for a washer.

We are trying to be good stewards with our ministry budget so it can be a sustainable one – so we try to allot a specific amount for each LLP event.  Needless to say, with the amount of patrons at the laundromat that morning, we ran through our allotment within an hour and a half.  We also ran out of breakfast food for the community within 10 minutes.  This month’s event was fast and furious!

Here are some action pics:

Here is an overall shot of the event:

Here is our faithful face painting volunteer “L”:

 Here is our volunteer “A” and her son “R” serving a patron:

Here is our volunteer “C” chatting with a LLP regular “N”:

Here is a first time volunteer “HJ” and her daughter.  They were much needed help for our event:

Here are volunteers “S” and her daughter “K” serving another regular LLP patron “V”.

We also had an opportunity to spread the word about our weekly bible study at the laundramat, and were blessed with opportunities to do life together the two weeks after this event – which we will share in another post.

Thanks to God for allowing Irving Bible Church and Laundry Love Project to serve together and spread the Good News.

Cinco De Mayo: Next Laundry Love Project

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With last month marking the one year Anniversary of LLPIrving, we look forward to what God has in store for Year 2.  With the kickoff of our new bible study Life After Laundry, we are in the midst of praying for God’s direction on the day and time best suited for our study.  We are also praying for a group of people who attend the LLP events to help establish a core group for this new study.

Another new thing we’re going to also start is LLPirving’s “VERSE OF THE MONTH”.   ”S”, the owner of the Amigo Laundramat installed eight large bulletin boards on each side of the facility.  He thought it would be a good idea if we post some information about our ministry or church.  We thought that was great and are hoping to take it one step further with a poster quoting a Bible verse.  We pray that these verses are planted into the patron’s hearts, give hope and inspiration.  Check out our inaugural verse:

Here is the info for this month’s event: 

Time:  9am – noon (last load at 11:15am)
Where: Amigo Laundry
3349 Country Club Drive W, Irving, TX


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If you plan on doing laundry that day, please swing by for up to 3 loads of laundry free – no strings attached (we are there to serve).  We also provide free laundry supplies, refreshments, and children activities.

If you would like to make a donation or sign up to volunteer, please click on links above.

We look forward to seeing you all there!

Life After Laundry’s first session

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God had a reason for us to be there tonight. We thought we were there for a bible study. We brought bibles to give away to those who didn’t have one, snacks, and water bottles. We had study guides to pass out in case they didn’t have one. Only problem was no one showed up. We didn’t have high expectations given this was the first week and given we only had one Laundry Love event to advertise it. We weren’t even discouraged because we were being obedient to what God wanted us to do.

So we spent about 30 minutes just catching up with each other and coming up with ideas to help get the word out to the community. As we started putting things away and packing up ready to leave, we started talking about a man, “T” that we had served at LLP, then started volunteering with us and attended church services as well. About a month ago we were having a hard time getting in touch with him. The cell phone number he had went straight to voice mail. No one was home when we came by to say hi. The day of the LLP we stopped by and his mom answered and said that he had not been home for almost a week and had not called her.

We were really worried about him and his well-being, so tonight since we were in the neighbrhood we decided to swing by his place again. His mom,”V” answered the door and we started talking. She said that “T” had finally come by to see her about an hour after we had visited her during the LLP event. She had said that “T” had either lost his phone or it got stolen and he did not have our phone numbers to call us. We were glad that he was okay and we then focused on “V”. She started opening up to us about her struggles that she is going through with work, or lack of it and struggles to find a better opportunity and pay the rent. She has reached a point to where it affects her physically and she is also contemplating moving out of state. We asked her if we could pray for her, she gladly accepted and so we joined hands and prayed for her, for God to reveal His plan for her and to continue recognizing that He is the Great Provider. “V” said that her job schedule doesn’t allow her to go to church on Sunday, so we mentioned to her that we are now holding a bible study on Wednesday nights so she can get her fill of God’s word within walking distance!

As we said goodnight to “V”, we had told her that we hope “T” was doing well and she said that he was outside somewhere and look for a guy in a yellow shirt. So once we left her apartment building and turned the corner, lo and behold, “T” was standing there hanging out with a friend. We hugged him and caught up on things. He said that he is going through a lot right now, that he is now unemployed, and that he needs prayer and God back in his life. We could tell he is in pain both physically and emotionally. So in the middle of an apartment parking lot, with a bunch of people outside – they saw three men holding hands, eyes closed and praying to our Lord for “T”. “T” had forgotten about our bible study but seemed to have rekindled that fire he had before when he first met us. He wants us to pick him up for church service this Sunday (neither “V” nor “T” have a car) and is wanting to attend the next Wednesday bible study.

So even though no one showed up at our inagural Life after Laundry bible study, God already had our first session planned out and lead us to “T” and “V”. If this is the kind of night we had on a night where we had no one show up, then I can’t wait to see what He has in store for us on a night when people start showing up!

Next Life after Laundry study is next Wednesday, April 18th – hope to see you there. Blessings to you all.

April 11th: Life After Laundry

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You are cordially invited to join us for our inaugural session of our bible study called “Life After Laundry”.  We have been serving the surrounding community of Amigo Laundramat and Sam Houston Middle School by providing free laundry for the last 12 months and God has led us to start a new bible study for them to 1) further build our relationship with the community on a weekly basis instead of a monthly basis. We can grow closer to each other, share our struggles and pray and care for each other, and  2) provide an environment for the community to either establish a fath or grow in their faith with our Lord Jesus.

Please click on the following link to download and print this week’s worksheet: WEEK 1 WORKSHEET

We pray that you would consider joining us for drinks/snacks, fellowship, prayer and a nice informal open discussion about our Lord Jesus.  We begin April 11th from 6:30pm to 8pm at Amigo Laundry, 3349 Country Club Drive W, Irving, TX:


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Blessings,
Laundry love Project Irving