Have you ever thought about volunteering in the community and didn’t know where to start? To be honest, in the past I had not thought about it, other than at my church. Then my oldest son needed volunteer hours for Honor Society. I heard about a nonprofit in our community that helps homeless and at risk youth, so we began there. My kids and I had our first experience volunteering by organizing their clothing closet. A year later, when I was the president of a homeschool group, our board wanted to help out in the community, and I knew very little of the different ways to carry this out. I had to do some research to find various ways our group could get involved. One way I was educated was through our homeschool teen group. As a group, we would go out and sort food at Northwest Harvest-a non-profit that distributes food for the hungry, and we cleaned and sorted food at the Union Gospel Mission. One place that I had not heard of until a little more than a year ago, is now my husbands place of work, Love In the Name of Christ of Yakima (Love INC). This non-profit is doing amazing things in the community. It is also a national organization, with 134 affiliates across the country. My husband, Dan, is the Executive Director of the Yakima, Washington affiliate. We are so thankful that God led him to this new position.

Our mission at Love In the Name of Christ of Yakima (Love INC) is to “mobilize local churches to transform lives and communities in the name of Christ” and the primary way we see that mission accomplished is through the work of the amazing volunteers that serve at Love INC each week. Every week we have volunteers that work in the office, sort donations, put together pantry boxes, take phone calls from potential clients, teach Life Skills Classes, mentor program participants and so much more. Every thing our volunteers do plays a part in seeing lives and our community transformed, because God has chosen to work through His people, the church, the Body of Christ to do His work in the world today. We are so thankful for everyone of our volunteers because we know that without them none of what we do would be possible.

-Dan Brown

To find out more, visit the Love INC national website at loveinc.org or if you are local, you may also go to loveincyakima.org. Think about ways you can give back to the community and volunteer together with your family!