Washing Machine Story

[Sam]

A couple of days ago I finished reading a book titled “Liberia Sweet.” It was written by Sam Latta and tells some of his experiences as a missionary for 19 years in Liberia. He went there with his wife and four children whose ages ranged from 5 up to 9. Sam graduated from the Apostolic Bible Institute in St. Paul, MN in 1957. I was there that year but didn’t really know him very well, just that he was from Moline, IL and had a pretty sister named Hilda who was, I think, in the same first year class that I was. There are several good stories in that book but one that I want to pass on is about a washing machine. This is from pages 41 to 44 of the book. Sam’s wife Joyce home schooled the children. A young woman named Mary helped in their home with laundry, cleaning, etc.

Our washing machine is not an automatic. It is a wringer type washer. Joyce taught Mary how to use the washer. She cautioned her of the danger of being careless with the wringer. She instructed her on how to use the emergency trip levers on either side of the wringer. She told Mary, “If any piece of laundry gets caught, and begins to wrap itself around the rollers, hit the trip lever to release the spring tension on the rollers, and shut off the wringer. This will allow one to remove the clothing caught in the rollers. Do not try to pull the article of clothing out of the rollers while they are turning. It can pull your fingers and hand into the rollers. It can injure you badly.”

After these instructions, Mary did very well with the laundry for a long time. One day Mary is doing the laundry and Joyce is having school with the children, when suddenly, a desperate blood chilling scream came from the laundry room. Joyce ran to the laundry room and found a terrified an agonizing Mary with her arm in the washer’s wringer. She had tried to keep some garments from wrapping around the rollers. It caught her fingers and pulled her hand and half of her forearm into that terrible squeeze between those hard rubber rollers. The pain was unbearable. Joyce immediately began to hit the release bars with all her might. After much frantic effort the spring locked rollers broke loose and she was able to get Mary’s arm out of the wringer. Mary is in so much pain. She could not stop crying.

He goes on to tell how they took Mary to one hospital and were sent to another where her arm ws x-rayed. There were no bones broken, just a painful bruise.

He then continues the story:

Now we have a washer with no wringer. A part in the wringer that latched the rollers together broke off. To get a new part, you have to buy a new washing machine. I kept an eye open for a washing machine, but finding one would take a miracle. We made it a matter of prayer that God would help us with this washing machine problem. With six in our family plus Mary, we have a lot of laundry to do.

Jesus works sometimes in very unusual ways. The Liberian Roads Department built a gravel road around the city of Monrovia from the sea to Bushrod Island. It is called the Freeway and a real time saver to get to some parts of the city. I drove it frequently.

A few days after the washer fiasco, I am driving the freeway, and caught quick glimpse of something in the edge of the bush. It was just a flash of something white as I sped by. I saw it again on the return trip. I saw it again on the next day. Every time I drove that route, I saw it. After a couple of weeks it occurred to me, to stop and see what this mysterious object in the edge of the bush might be. I stopped the car and walked down through the ditch and over the graded edge of the road to the white thing that had caught my interest. There it lay on the ground before me. It is a washing machine wringer exactly like ours. It has a problem though. It has been run over by one of the bulldozers and smashed flat. I picked it up and threw it on the ground a few times to dislodge any unwelcome critters that may have found lodging in it. I carried it back to the car and put it in the trunk.

When I got home I took the broken, bent up thing from the car. I found the toolbox and took it apart. To my amazement, there is only one part in it that is not damaged. Can you believe it? The portion left undamaged is the very part I need to fix our washer. I installed the good part in our wringer, and the washer worked perfectly as long as we labored in Liberia. No more wringing clothes by hand.

He then finishes this chapter with the following:

Truly God does love us. He turned the water into wine to save a young couple embarrassment at their wedding feast, when they had run out of refreshment. Jesus has shown us so many times that He cares about the small things that are important to our lives.

[Sam]

Over the years we have several stories of God's provision.

One year as summer was drawing to a close and fall and back to school were coming on, our kids needed some clothes.
My wife was praying for God to supply some underwear for our boys.
The phone rang. It was her cousin. They rarely spoke, no problem, just each busy with family, etc.
Her cousin said, "I've been cleaning out dresser drawers. Could your boys use some underwear?"

-------------------------
One time our youngest son wanted to go on a bike hike with his class at school.
He would need a better bike. Ours did not have gearshifts and were not in very good shape.
He wanted to know if he could get a new bike, and my wife told him there was no way we could do that.
He asked if it would be OK to pray to Jesus for a new bike and my wife agreed.
As the time for the bike hike drew near, there was an open house at General Electric where I worked.
We went and the kids all got to see where Dad worked.
There was a contest in which we had to guess the total ages of all the GE employees.
Not long before that I had been in a class on equal opportunity and I had been told that the average age of GE employees was 45.
I also knew that there were approximately 20,000 employees at the time.
So I multiplied 20,000 times 45, added random numbers instead of those zeroes at the end and submitted the entry in his name.
The following Monday I received a phone call telling me Keith had won the prize which was $100.00.
That night at dinner, my wife asked each child, "What would you do if someone gave you $100?"
Keith' answer was, "I'd buy a bike for the bike hike."
Pat said, "Well, it's yours. You won $100."
Keith was so excited he ran out to tell his friends.
In a few minutes one of his friends came in and said, "Mrs. Ellis, did Keith really win $100?"
When she replied in the affirmative, the boy ran from the house hollering, "It's a miracle!"
I believe it was a miracle and a picture of God's providence.

Our English word "provide" comes from "pro" and "videre" which means to see ahead.
God saw ahead and I was in that class at just the right time to receive information which resulted in winning a prize months later.
God saw ahead and provided that bicycle for Keith at just the right time.

[Sam]

Another story is about a house God provided.

I'm not good at managing money.
We filed bankruptcy and lost a house we were buying.
We had to rent for a few years and by then we had 5 children.
God made a way for us to buy a house but we almost lost it and God provided a buyer before it was foreclosed.
We were renting again and the house we were renting was put up for sale and we had to move.
We had no money for a down payment and our credit was shot. Also, we could not find some place to rent.

We found a house that had been rented out but was now vacant and was for sale.
The price was $20,000. This was in 1971 and that was a pretty good price for a pretty good house in a pretty good neighborhood.
We looked at the house. It needed some cleaning up and painting. The carpet had large worn places in it with the padding exposed.
We made an offer of $20,000 which was the full asking price.
We offered to do the painting and cleanup for a credit of $2000 which would be shown as a down payment.
Sale would be contingent on our getting a loan approved.
When my wife mentioned that to the realtor he said, "Why, that's a ridiculous offer. I won't even mention it to the listing agent."
The listing agent asked him later what the result was when he showed us the house.
He told her that we had made a ridiculous offer and he wouldn't even present it.
She asked him what we had offered and said she would present it to the seller.
The seller agreed and the loan approval process was started. We were rejected for a loan.
We appealed the rejection and our insurance man wrote a letter stating that we had always paid him when he loaned us money to pay our insurance.
Months dragged by. Then one day we received a call that our loan had been approved and we could have the house.
My wife hung up the phone and started to cry. Our 10 or 11 year old son said, "See, Mommy, you almost lost your faith."

Well, we got the house but it was still contingent on an FHA inspection to verify that we had completed our part of the contract.
We removed the carpet and discovered that the hardwood floors underneath did not have to be refinished or replaced, just waxed and buffed.
I painted every room in the house, some times working all night.
My wife scrubbed down every aluminum window frame with steel wool to remove years of accumulated smoke stains.
I trimmed the bushes and cut the grass.
The FHA inspector just made a very brief inspection and we passed.
God gave us that house.
We lived there from 1971 until 1977 and sold it to buy the larger house we are living in today.

[freeatlast]

Thanks Sam or those stories. I have known the Latta's for years. I attended that Moline church for 20 years.

[Sam]

Originally Posted by freeatlast

Thanks Sam or those stories. I have known the Latta's for years. I attended that Moline church for 20 years.

I didn't really know the Lattas. I went to a church in Racine, WI back in the 1955-1956 time period. The pastor was L.R. Mitchell. He was related to the Lattas in some way. As I mentioned, I really didn't know Sam at Bible School, maybe speaking to him a couple of times during the year I was there. His sister Hilda would have been out of my league since she was a preacher's daughter but there was one young man at our Racine church that was "sweet on her" at one time back then. I did meet Wayne Mitchell at ABI while I was there. He was related somehow to the Lattas and pastored there. I have a friend named Joe Plunk who now lives in Ohio and his brother was at one time a pastor in Moline, IL. So, I have never been there or really known the folks there but know a little about them.

Sam Latta's website is
http://www.samlatta.com/

The website for the Moline, IL church is
http://apostolicsanctuary.org/home.html

[Bella1]

Wonderful stories of how God will work in your life! He is good, All the time!

[rgcraig]

This story is of a want, not a need, but God still provided to let us know he cared!

Our first year of marriage we assisted in a church in Ohio. We weren't paid much at all and a couple of times the check from the church actually bounced. In front of our apartment complex was a Baskin Robbins and we'd have to drive by it every day and never had enough "extra" to buy a cone.

One night after church we wanted a cone so bad, but didn't have the $$'s for it, so we went on to our apt. and felt sorry for ourselves.

About 15 minutes later - someone knocked on our door and there was two arms from around the corner holding two praline and cream DOUBLE dipped ice cream cones. The arms belonged to our pastor's wife and daughter.

It really meant a lot to us because we knew that God cared about us and wanted to let us know he KNEW where we were. I'll never forget it!

[freeatlast]

H

Originally Posted by Sam

I didn't really know the Lattas. I went to a church in Racine, WI back in the 1955-1956 time period. The pastor was L.R. Mitchell. He was related to the Lattas in some way. As I mentioned, I really didn't know Sam at Bible School, maybe speaking to him a couple of times during the year I was there. His sister Hilda would have been out of my league since she was a preacher's daughter but there was one young man at our Racine church that was "sweet on her" at one time back then. I did meet Wayne Mitchell at ABI while I was there. He was related somehow to the Lattas and pastored there. I have a friend named Joe Plunk who now lives in Ohio and his brother was at one time a pastor in Moline, IL. So, I have never been there or really known the folks there but know a little about them.

Sam Latta's website is
http://www.samlatta.com/

The website for the Moline, IL church is
http://apostolicsanctuary.org/home.html

Small world..I've known Joe since he was kid.
his adopted brother Richard pastored Moline/Silvis church after his fatherinlaw WC Mitchel became ill.

Wayne's dad was Louis Mitchell, could that have been the L Mitchell you knew Sam.

Sam Latta was a cousin to Wayne M, so they did manage to keep the church in "the family" quite a while

Gary Randol pastors there today and they just built a new 5 to 6 million dollar building.

[freeatlast]

A story I heard refered to by Wayne Micthell in his preaching.

The church had a large payment coming up and no money to take care of it. Wayne said God spoke to him to go buy a new suit and or top coat and a hat.

Having no money, he went to Mosenfelders and charged these items.

That Sunday a visitor was at church. After church this visitor handed Pastor Micthell two envelopes, telling him one was for the church, the other envelope was for him.

Later he opened those envelopes. One contained the amount needed for the church debt, the other had the amount needed to pay for the new suit etc.

The guest was never seen again.

[commonsense]

Sam Latta was our pastor for 2 yrs ( early 70's). He had lots of great stories about Liberia.