Soap & Suds:   Journey of Faith has a laundry and shower facility available to families and individuals experiencing homelessness. We are always looking for volunteers to host our guests and provide them with a meal while they're at the facility showering or washing their clothes.   We set up appointments for guests to use this service on Monday — Friday at 10:00 a.m. and 1:30 p.m. 

Clothing Closet:   At the church, we have a room filled with clothing items that have been donated to give to people who need them. We are always looking for more donations (clean clothes in good shape, only), as well as, people to volunteer to organize what we receive. Donated clothing are given to homeless guests at the church when they're using our facility to wash their clothes and bathe. 

Cold Weather Care Kits:  These kits are given to the homeless needing basic toiletries. We're always collecting new soap, toilet paper, toothpaste and other items. We are also looking for people to volunteer to help put the cold weather care kits together and deliver them to our homeless brothers and sisters in the community.

Food Pantry Update (March 2021):  

In the early days of the COVID pandemic, chaos and confusion caused food pantries and churches across Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti to shut down. At Journey of Faith, we recognized that these shut downs created a space of high need for many in our community, especially those we've worked with living in camps or cars and who relied on getting a warm meal from St. Annes or a bag of groceries from the Backdoor Food Pantry. So after much thought and reflection, we decided to step up and help out where we could. We expanded our already existing emergency food pantry, set up in our Fellowship Hall area and started packing bags.

One year later, we've served over 1500 bags of emergency food to our community across the county. What started as an effort to feed those living in camps/cars/hotels (our bags offers high nutrient food that doesn't need to be cooked) has blossomed into help for those recovering from surgery and unable to leave their beds, young people's after school snacks and supplemental food for those who get groceries from our partner, Peace House, Ypsi.

We are proud of the work we've done during COVID! What we thought would last a few months has, through lots of hard work, donations from community, and lots of prayers managed to survive and serve hungry people for an entire year!

Now, we're taking a break. During our break we will rest, but we will also reflect and have conversations with our partners, homeless ministry and the homeless community to assess shifting needs as COVID simultaneously continues and vaccinations and other help starts to make it to our communities.

During our break, we will continue to offer a parsed down emergency food pantry for people that visit our Soap and Suds program throughout the week. Also, people that usually come to our food pantry have been connected to Peace House and other pantries that can meet their needs while we're on break.

Monetary and food donations made to Journey of Faith during our break will be used to fill the emergency food pantry or redirected to Peace House, Ypsi to help them meet the higher demand.

We're excited to see what this upcoming year holds for us!

Art on a Journey Gallery: Homeless and formerly homeless whose individual stories, history and perspectives create beautiful works that are unique to each artist's experience. A wide variety of style, size and method is the hallmark of the collection of featured works by local artists.  When homeless artists create and sell art they gain much needed financial support and self esteem through the value of their work.

We offer a free and open gallery serving the homeless at Journey of Faith featuring a local homeless or at risk artists’ amazing gifts and works. All artwork is for sale (cash only). Artists are also donating 10% of what they sell to Journey of Faith's homeless ministry. Making sense of the world and finding meaning and purpose in it — is a journey we're all on.  

School Backpacks and Supplies:  When school is about to start — it’s a time of excitement, fun, and discovery for many children. But, for some homeless students, it means showing up at school without crayons or pencils, notebooks or other supplies they need.  Unfortunately, many parents can’t pay for their children's supplies and some public schools are also unable to provide the necessary items.

The "Body of Christ" can help to fill the gap — not for everybody, but where we can, we do. Journey of Faith's School Backpack ministry partners with The University of Michigan’s Information and Technology Services (ITS) and Michigan Medicine’s Health Information Technology & Services (HITS) to provide school backpacks , on a “first come, first served” basis to homeless children. Contact the church office for more information.

Memorial Service and Repast: One of the most blessed and special gifts Journey of Faith received was a request by homeless community members from to host a memorial service for a beloved friend. It would be a chance for more than 45 homeless members to celebrate and recognize the friend they had cared about and who made a difference in their lives.

Journey of Faith worked with the community to plan a memorial service. The service was opened up to anyone who wanted to come forward and share a story or two. At the conclusion of the service, Journey of Faith hosted a “family-style” meal for attendees.

Contact the church office at (734) 971-4245 or jofdisciples@gmail.com for more information on how Journey of Faith, on a limited basis, may be able to provide some support. In creating personalized services, with the individual’s favorite music, and stories from their friends, and using his or her name, the community reminds itself of the fullness of that individual. Being treated with respect and cared for — is all most of us really want.

Daytime Warming Center:  Journey of Faith, in partnership with churches, hosts the Daytime Warming Center usually in December and March. Volunteers are needed to help prepare and serve meals, visit with guests and provide donations of toiletries, wool socks, and undergarments for our guests.

Sleeping Mats for the Homeless: We're partnering with retirement centers in Dexter and Chelsea to do something unusual and wonderful with seniors — we’re making sleeping mats for our homeless brothers and sisters in our community. We've got a couple of great volunteers ready to teach you how to make “balls of plarn” — that's short for "plastic yarn."  

Plarn is made by cutting plastic grocery bags into strips, which are then crocheted together into a single long strand. By some miracle, plastic bags become plarn and that gets woven together to make sleeping mats for the homeless.

Each mat keeps 500-700 plastic bags out of a landfill. We get a chance to do our "creative thing" and weave it into serving others. And, more importantly, it’s a chance to connect seniors with opportunities that make the most of their experience and skills – to allow them to remain productive, feel engaged and unlock value for our community. What's not to love!

Christmas Giving Store:   This year, we'd like to provide gifts for homeless guests at the Daytime Warming Center to give to a family member or friend.  It's our hope to have everyone share in the Christmas spirit even those who really don't have anything tangible to give. We would like to collect new gifts (under $10).   

A "wishlist" is available of suggested items to donate.  You can also donate something else you feel is a little bit more unique or special to give.  Your donation of a gift, under $10, will be most appreciated — whatever it is. 

With your help, homeless guests coming to the Daytime Warming Center in December will be able to be part of the gift-giving process too.  We'll have gift wrapping supplies for our homeless guests to decorate the gifts you've so generously donated for them to give away.  

 Do you want to make a donation today to support this ministry?