Wednesday, September 30, 2015

Loud!

The wonderful workers started showing up Tuesday ready to work and work there was. We had 2 full mailboxes full of letters and studies to process. Marie put Timothy and Justin right to work. We needed wrapped Bibles and these 2 boys were able to wrap over 10 boxes.
The piles of mail are growing each week.
Thankfully the volunteers keep on coming. I think they enjoy working together, just check out the visiting going on while opening the Tuesday  mail.

Monday, September 28, 2015

Camera Home

The camera was picked up and the pictures downloaded from our Tuesday group of volunteers. This was the day I thought we would have very few volunteers and was worried about getting the huge mail load done. The first picture is just some of the big piles of mail.
 We were so thankful a new 'young' volunteer showed up. Below Janelle is hard at work opening the studies with Eva Jean. Glenna is behind them with her own huge piles of studies.
 Poor Janelle, she was put to work unloading an entire pallet of Bibles on Tuesday then loading them back up for mailing on Thursday. We are praying she will come back this week. Jeanette was given a flower today. This was sent in with one of the request letters with a note this rose was sent to us in love.
 Marie's mother-in-law drove all the way from Forrest, IL with her grandson to come help us. They were put right to work folding studies, stuffing them in the Bibles then getting the Bibles wrapped for mailing.
 Mike walked during a very busy morning and we think he was kind of shocked at how many volunteers were crowded into both rooms. Below he is very emphatically explaining something to David. Pictured is Glenna, Jan, Chuck, Eva Jean, Jeanette, Timmy, Timmy's grandma's back, Mike, Marie's back, Dave, Shirley, mom's hand and Jeanette. 
Pictured are Timmy, his grandma, his cousin, Marie and David who was emphatically making his point right back at Mike.
When we finished up Thursday we were all thankful. We survived another week.

Thursday, September 3, 2015

Productive SO Productive Day

We had a wonderful productive day at Berean, much much easier than Tuesday. That probably is because the amount of mail that came in today was manageable. That and the fact we had a lot of nimble fingers, strong backs and willing workers. Not that Tuesday's group wasn't willing we were just so overwhelmed. Mark had arrived with a pallet of Bibles even before I got to the office. With Marie and Justin's help we almost had them all unloaded before Joan and her kids arrived to help. Below are a few pictures of the day and one short video. We ran out of stamped envelopes and had a little competition on who could stamp the most envelopes in the shortest amount of time. Check out who WON, the answer is at the end of the video!
Below Faith and Timmy are opening the Bible boxes.
 Justin is holding just a few of the address labels of today. 
 Berlica is helping slice open the boxes with our wonderful letter openers Cheryl donated.
 Notice how each child has one of those wonderful letter openers. They were put to good use today.
 We have an assembly line going with unpacking, stuffing and labeling.
 We had a new volunteer come today all the way from Tremont. 
 JulieAnn was put to work with Marie and Diane R reading letters.
 Joan kept the other room hopping, processing almost an entire pallet load of Bibles.
 Berlica graduated from stamping envelopes to applying labels to Bibles. She was very proud of herself. She was careful to put them on right side up. 
 Roma and Hannah were put to work filling boxes.
 We finished by lunch and all were able to sit down for a nice meal. I'm not sure what everyone is shocked about in the picture below but it must have been Diane R's change of clothes. She was heading out to another job at 1:00 pm and went from fancy to work ready in the blink of an eye.
 Below Chuck has brought in a box to fill with Bible studies to be graded. He is mailing them to his brother-in-law and sister Lynn and Mim Klopfenstein all the way to South Carolina. They take around a hundred a week for grading. So so thankful to anyone willing to grade the thousands that come in each month. Justin has his hands full of Bibles ready to be stacked back inside the box until next Tuesday. 
We have a hard time keeping up with the requests each week. The prisoners that write and request a Bible are hungry for the Word of God. Our jails and prison guards are reporting good things happening. I believe a revival is happening in prisons all over the United States. Pray the people on the outside will also make this oh so important decision. The time is so short and God would not have any perish! 

Tuesday, September 1, 2015

Unfinished Undone

We were undone today, we had to leave work unfinished. Well we could have stayed to finish it but the volunteers would have needed their pajamas and sleeping bags. We had a good crew of volunteers but it was just too much mail. Below are a few pictures of our very busy morning, the lunch break and our chaotic afternoon. Vonnie came in to pick up the papers she needed for Skyline so we put her right to work opening mail with Glenna, Joyce, Chuck and Eva Jean.
These are the Bibles that were mailed out today. These were really last Thursday's requests from when we ran out of Bible stamps. By the time these had the postage added and were loaded into my car there were around 200 mailed out today.
  Jan, mom, Shirley, and Kathy worked on letters while Jeanette opened studies. 
 I was so grateful for each and everyone that came and donated time for this program. It is a little overwhelming right now.
 Marie brought Megan, Justin and Timmy over on Saturday and they filled boxes and made thousands of copies but we still ran out of studies to be stuffed so below these ladies are filling boxes so we could fill the requests today.
 Eva Jean and Chuck are applying the stamps to envelopes before the next step of separating them by the number.
 Wayne and Lukie provided the lunch today and did we ever have a treat. Lukie brought in Avanti sandwhiches with double the meat, fresh fruit, and veggies.
 While Wayne provide his speciality, He baked a pineapple upside down cake out on his grill and let me tell you it was amazing. The cake was so light and fluffy and the topping so moist and delicious we finally asked him what did he do to make this so good and he told us his secret. He added a stick of butter on top of the pineapples then apple pie filling to 'spice it up'. That was topped with vanilla ice cream.
After lunch Shirley and I kept entering the studies, Chuck and Eva Jean kept labeling the envelopes and the rest separated and started stuffing. 
By 4:00 pm we were all exhausted and ready to quit. These volunteers are going to sleep good tonight. What a long hard day. So so thankful that this office has air conditioning. We had a high of 95 degrees outside.
Don't forget, the Berean Banquet on September 11th at 5 Points Washington. The meal starts at 6:30 pm. Spread the word, we are having a stamp drive during the banquet. There will be a basket to put any stamps you care to spare for the Bible studies. A roll of stamps will bless 100 prisoners with his next study but if you don't have a spare roll to share even ONE stamp will help and who knows that ONE stamp may reach one unsaved prisoner and introduce him to the One who saves!