She parked her van in front of A Ray of Hope, desperate for help.

Her gas tank was almost as empty as her wallet, and somehow she had to get her sick child to Missoula for a doctor’s appointment. Volunteers at the ministry took her in, handed her some paperwork and began asking questions.

The distraught mother told them about how her child was having seizures.

How she and her husband had moved their family from Ronan to Bigfork to be closer to Walmart, where he had gotten a job.

How they recently had to choose between paying their phone bill and paying their rent. They had chosen the latter, keeping a roof over their heads — for now — but leaving them without a phone should their child have a medical emergency.

She had been without hope, but found it at the aptly named ministry.

For 11 years, A Ray of Hope has provided a safe haven and a helping hand for hundreds of people in the Flathead Valley.

This summer the ministry has come full circle, opening a thrift store in the former Flathead Food Bank on Sixth Avenue West in Kalispell. Hope Thrift opened in June but celebrates its grand opening Thursday.

Helping the homeless has always been on Ray of Hope founder Peggy Christensen’s heart. Board member Glenda Brown, who has been Christensen’s friend for 18 years, credits her passion in large part to Christensen’s deep faith in God.

Christensen and her husband, Bob, were raised in households where serving others was expected. Christensen’s parents would chop extra wood or cook extra food and send their daughter around the neighborhood making deliveries, Brown said.

When they married, the Christensens continued the example their parents had set.

They raised 36 foster children and two of their own, Brown said. By day, Christensen’s legal office was a place where people could seek help with Constitution-related issues; by night, it wasn’t uncommon to find people with nowhere else to go sleeping in the basement.

“She and Bob, their entire lives have been committed to serving Jesus Christ by serving his broken children,” Brown said.

In 1999, after the couple moved to Kalispell, Christensen opened A Ray of Hope. Then it was a thrift store on U.S. 2 intended to raise money for the down and out.

But when a World War II veteran arrived at closing time one icy night, Christensen didn’t refuse him shelter. As she pulled out a mattress for him to sleep on, he returned with three friends — and the homeless shelter was born.

Four years later, Christensen fell ill and had to close the store. By then the shelter had a new home on Appleway Drive. When that property was sold to build apartment complexes, a local benefactor paid the down payment at the ministry’s current location, a historic house on the corner of First Street and Fifth Avenue West.

In March, the Ray of Hope board learned that the former food bank property, located just a block from the shelter at 105 Sixth Ave. W., was for sale. It was ideal for a thrift store, which could help keep the donation-dependent ministry afloat.

Donations were necessary if the ministry was going to buy the property, so the board turned to the community for help. Donors responded generously, giving twice as much as A Ray of Hope needed to make the purchase.

“This community is so generous,” Brown said. “People give from the heart continuously.”

That continuous giving stocked the thrift store’s shelves in time for its unofficial June opening. Over the years, people have donated everything from clothing to Christmas decorations to entire households of furniture.

In addition to providing a relatively low-cost place to shop and funding the ministry, Hope Thrift offers a place for people to regain skills they will need to re-enter the workforce.

Some workers come from Experience Works, a program that helps people 55 and older find jobs. Other employees are staying at the shelter, Brown said.

“People at the shelter put in a minimum of two hours a day here, but some spend a lot more,” she said.

In a sense, the thrift store employees are working for a family business; once they come to A Ray of Hope, they become part of the ministry’s family, Brown said. Often people whose lives were turned around after turning to A Ray of Hope become ministry supporters, even if they can only give a few dollars a month.

As a Christian-based nonprofit, A Ray of Hope doesn’t take any federal funding, Brown said. That means the ministry isn’t bound by the same rules that govern other homeless shelters, such as Samaritan House. People can stay as long as they need to, Brown said.

However long it takes, A Ray of Hope is there to help, she said.

Sometimes it means taking people in; the shelter averages up to 18 people in the summer and about twice as many in the winter. But the ministry also helps people with everything from finding mental health services to providing financial and spiritual counseling to loaning much-needed money.

“It’s so much more than a homeless shelter,” Brown said.

“We hear constantly, ‘I had no hope,’” she added. “A Ray of Hope gives people hope.”

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com.