Thrift center raises $3 million for Bible League ministry
in the Philippines

CHICAGO—Gifts of time, dedication, and donated items recently put a Bible League-affiliated thrift store in Orland Park, IL over the $3 million sales mark.

Since it opened in 1997, Orland Park’s Bibles for Missions Thrift Center has sold more than $3.2 million of donated clothing, furniture, antiques, and other household goods. A team of volunteers tirelessly sort, price, clean, shelve, and sell the items to help provide Christians in the Philippines with God’s Word. So far, more than two million Filipinos have received their own New Testaments through these efforts.

“I continue to be amazed at the level of dedication of our Thrift Center volunteers,” said Robert W. Cole, Bible League’s president. “They work long hours, their work is sometimes tedious, sometimes physically difficult, and yet they always seem to be smiling. They have so many choices of where to spend their time and energy. I am so thankful to God that they choose to minister with the Bible League.”

The Orland Park store is one of 14 Bibles for Missions Thrift Centers in the United States. They help fulfill Bible League’s mission to prepare children and adults for a closer walk with God by providing the New Testaments and Bibles that are placed into the hands of people around the world who complete Bible studies.

Since 1993, when the first store opened in Holland, MI, the thrift centers have contributed funding for millions of Bibles and New Testaments in areas where Bible League has ministry, including Bulgaria, China, Colombia, Ecuador, Indonesia, Kenya, Mexico, Nigeria, the Philippines, and Ukraine. They fund, on average, a combined total of 4,600 Scriptures every day they are open.

In the Philippines, with about 40 percent of the population living in abject poverty, receiving a copy of God’s Word by completing a Bible study is a wonderful blessing for many people who can’t afford to purchase their own.

“When the world is saturated with Bibles, then I will stop working,” said one devoted thrift center volunteer.

“I continue to be amazed at the level of dedication of our Thrift Center volunteers," said Robert W. Cole, Bible League's president. "They work long hours, their work is sometimes tedious, sometimes physically difficult, and yet they always seem to be smiling.”

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In their own words
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