California Church Uses Yard Sales to Fuel Global Missions
April 2025
Have you ever heard of a church having a Spanish congregation, an English congregation, and a culture of yard sales? If not, meet Bellflower Brethren Church in Bellflower, California. To be more accurate, it is a missions culture funded in part by monthly yard sales.
Maria Martinez is the main architect of this culture and she leads a team of about 22 people from both the Spanish and English congregations. They gather donations (items for the sale) from the community and the congregants, and host a large yard sale. For the past five years, they have faithfully had a yard sale every month, except for some months in which inclement weather prohibited a sale.
The entire purpose of these sales is to raise money for missions. Maria says that every month the sale brings in $1,500–$3,000. The money is used in various ways, including supporting orphanages and elder care facilities in Central America, building houses, sharing the Gospel in Africa, and maintaining an evangelistic soccer ministry in Cuba.
Aside from the donations for the yard sale, they also get donations of food, which they personally deliver to orphanages and elder care missions in Mexico. They send teams to Cuba and Central America to help distribute food, share the Gospel, and generally be the light of Jesus to those who need to know Him.
They also see the sale itself as a mission field, as they have a team of evangelists that mingle with those coming to shop at the sale. They pass out information about the church and have seen many people visit the church as a result—and some of those visitors have stayed to get involved in various ways!
At Bellflower Brethren, a simple yard sale has been a catalyst for mission. It has helped materially, but maybe more importantly it has helped to mobilize their people for mission. Perhaps this could be a good opportunity in your church’s context as well!
More Stories
Zeke felt God nudging him toward ministry ever since high school, but be com ing a pastor just...
March 30, 2026
"Once we made th ose small change s , our church plant stopped losing people coming in and...
March 3, 2026
When Anna* was challenged to think about her goals for 2026, she sensed a clear nudge from God: begin preparing material to train others....
February 17, 2026
“In the 1980s, if you walked into a Christian bookstore in France, you’d find maybe two shelves of Christian books,” Florent...
February 13, 2026
As someone who’s spent much of his life planting churches in Asia, Ted now serves as the Director of Encompass...
February 10, 2026
Reaching the unreached is a beautiful idea, but it’s a lot easier said than done. Even so, Auburn Grace Community...
February 9, 2026
“I had no idea what Japan was,” Kya says. “Then my parents took me when I was 10, and now I wake up every day and think about...
January 30, 2026
Mika* grew up in Japan as part of a family that was culturally Buddhist, yet God gently placed people in her life who...
January 29, 2026
Grace Church in Simi Valley, California has been partnering with Encompass for over 60 years now, making us their primary missions agency. That...
January 23, 2026
