Years ago when Jesse was small, we had a series of books about Christopher Churchmouse, a mischievous little rodent who lived, I believe, in the church basement with his family and learned about right and wrong and spiritual truths.

We enjoyed those books, but those mice were evidently better behaved than the usual run of the mill mice.

I walked into our missions closet the other day to assess what was needed to stock up for our missions conference and discovered one set of shelves had been visited by mice. They left their little calling cards all over the place. I had just been in there two days before, and there had been no sign of them.

I thought at first a squirrel had been in there as we’d been having problems with them in other parts of the church (scurrying above the ceiling, peeking a head out the AC vent during choir practice, choosing some hidden corner as a final resting place and smelling up the whole facility). Some of the men have been diligent to climb around up there and remove the dead one (after a lot of work trying to find it), repairing holes, setting humane traps, etc. But a couple of the men said they felt like the missions closet visitors were mice rather than squirrels. So they set a trap and my husband and I went about cleaning things up.

I have to say, it was very disheartening! Thankfully the droppings were primarily on one set of bookcase-type shelves rather than all four. There were four bars of homemade soap that one of our ladies makes, and the mice really liked that stuff. They gnawed corners off all four bars. They also gnawed across several towels (looking for nesting material, maybe? I don’t know).

We vacuumed up all the droppings, took the towels home and washed them in hot water and disinfectant, and cleaned everything else off with disinfecting wipes. The towels above actually look better there after having been washed than when we first brought them home — here they just look like a few threads have been pulled, but before it did look like actual gnaw marks on them.

And we found out some of the towels weren’t very good quality: they burst into little fuzz balls after washing. It’s not unusual for new towels to give off more lint at first, but this was ridiculous. So I am glad some missionary family didn’t get those.

What’s funny is that the mice passed up boxed macaroni and cheese and jello for soap and towels. We don’t usually keep food in there for just such reasons, but one class gathered up some mostly canned and a few boxed goods for the closet without checking with me first. I decided to go ahead and put them in for a few months to see if anyone wanted them, but no one even looked at them, and some of the expiration dates have already passed. So between that and the critters, I am making it official policy: no food in the missions closet!

The trap did catch one mouse, I waited a couple of weeks before restocking the closet just to make sure we didn’t have any more unwanted “visitors.” I think they caught a couple more in other places, but so far the closet has been clear. Our missions conference started last night, so I restocked on Saturday. I put the new towels in big Ziploc bags so hopefully this won’t happen again. I hope as we take the various missionaries through there we don’t face any “surprises!!”

I’d like to hear if your church has a missions closet and how they organize it. I can always use new ideas. We don’t do a “points” system as I have heard that some do — the different families have different needs, different numbers of supporting churches and kids, etc., so we leave it open. Most lean more toward being reluctant to take too much than overdoing it — we sometimes have to encourage them to feel free to take whatever they might need. Most are on the road and can’t take a whole lot.

I was surprised that the most often chosen thing was queen sized sheet sets. Next would be towels and dish towels. We have some small tools and tools sets that are popular with the men, and sport balls of any kind are taken often as well. We have a bin of boys’ toys and girls’ toys, and most families will let their children pick one of two items out of there. Christian books and CDs are also popular as are travel irons. We have several toiletries, regular and sample sized, that I thought would be taken often, but I was surprised that they’re not.

It’s a fun ministry. It’s almost like playing Santa’s helper. 🙂 And every now and then there will be an unusual item someone donated (most of the items I purchase from our mission’s budget, but we’re open to new donated items as well) that turns out to be just what a particular missionary needed. It’s neat to participate in a ministry where you get to be a conduit for the Lord to work.