Volunteers provide valuable ministry at The Country Store
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Editor,
Here is a story about one of Lake County’s least recognized but perhaps most generous community supporters, The Country Store. It is amazing how this Main Street ministry in Polson has benefited the people throughout the county. I didn’t know much about the store until my wife Joyce volunteered to work there about 15 years ago.
The Country Store is currently managed by ladies (and a couple of men) from 10 of our local churches. Each participating church provides three or four volunteers to serve in the store for three hours every week. Go figure: 25 to 35 people volunteering three hours a week for approximately forty years. About 150 hours a year per person, times 30 comes to 4,500 hours a year; times, say 30 years, equals 135,000 hours of volunteerism.
I can only guess that this may be among the greatest and most joyful service ministries in the county. None of the volunteers receive a penny for their work. In fact, volunteers freely use their home laundry facilities to launder and dry hundreds of pounds of donated clothing every year.
The Country Store gave more than $30,000 dollars in 2016 to the following service agencies: Boys and Girls Club, Cheerful Heart, Helping Hands, Lake County Hospice, Polson Loaves and Fish, SAFE Harbor, senior citizens centers, YWAM Tribal Waves and to the sponsoring churches.
Store personnel select their own Board of Directors, all volunteers at the store, who have the authority to determine the guidelines for the daily management of the store and for the financial support of various service agencies in the community.
The store receives its inventory from generous people in Lake County who donate their things when they clean out a closet or spring clean their garage, etc. The store receives only new or clean clothing and small useable household items.
Three cheers for the volunteers at The Country Store.
Harvey A. Town
Polson
