A cool eBay story

The Story of the Black Robes

I've been doing eBay as a side business since 2000. I want to share one of my favorite experiences with an eBay transaction I had.

Several years ago, we were cleaning out the pastor's office at my church. He found a box that was filled with old black choir robes. Our church, Lighthouse Chapel of the Deaf, had newer yellow choir robes so we did not need these black ones. The first thing the pastor said was to throw them away.

I said... no, let me try to sell them on eBay. Never know maybe a group is looking for these. So... I did just that. I listed them on eBay.

I got several requests from potential buyers who wanted just ONE robe for graduation purposes. I preferred to sell them as a lot and not one by one. Then one day I got an email from a lady named Mary in Maryland.

Mary from Maryland entered my life

She explained that she was starting a choir and she was looking for black robes and my auction was perfect but... she didn't have a lot of money and wanted to know if I was willing to sell all of them for xxx amount of money (I can't even remember now what she said). I told her I would get back to her after speaking to the pastor.

My pastor said yes.... that was fine. Sell them to her for what she asked. I emailed Mary and told her and she was SO excited. Later that day the pastor emailed me and said he was thinking about the robes and said to tell Mary she could have the robes for FREE. She just had to pay the shipping costs. WOW... Mary was practically jumping up and down at this blessing. It was thrilling.

New information makes it extra special!

Somewhere along the line, she happened to mention that her choir is a signing choir! They were all hearing but they signed in ASL. Now this was super exciting as the robes were coming from a DEAF CHURCH! This made our connection even more personal.

I sent her the robes. I really didn't look at the robes that carefully but Mary said it was amazing as they had a child in their choir and there was a child (or small adult) size robe in the box. AWESOME the way God works.

I later received a video tape and photos of Mary and her choir wearing "our" robes. For several years Mary and I kept in touch but as sometimes happens, we lost touch with each other. I tried to contact her again last summer but she had since left that church and they didn't have a forwarding address.

Anyone know..

a Mary from Maryland who used to have a signing choir in Silver Springs? If you just so happen to read this post, contact me! I would love to catch up with Mary again. I hope you are still signing wherever you are!