You
are probably familiar with Operation Christmas Child. It's a program sponsored
by Samaritan's Purse (a relief and Christian evangelical organization headed by
Franklin Graham) which sends shoeboxes filled with surprises to needy children
around the globe. Individuals pack a shoebox with toys, school supplies,
personal hygiene items, etc. You have the option of shopping for a girl or a boy and there are three different age ranges from which you may chose.
The
boxes are then collected at a relay center where volunteers pack them into
cartons. At the end of the national collection week (which is today), the cartons are loaded
into trailers (by Randy and a few other men) and taken to a local collection center. Once there, they are
loaded into semis and taken to one of our nation's eight distribution centers.
For
the past week, I had the privilege of volunteering at our church to help
this endeavor. Although we have personally been donating filled boxes for over 20 years, this
is the first time our church was a relay center. That means that fellow churches and
individuals from surrounding neighborhoods brought boxes to us. We packed them
and today we wrapped-up. We were highly excited to be able to load up over
1,600 shoeboxes! It was amazing! The trailers were driven to the closest area collection center, which just happens to be my parents' church. These particular boxes will ultimately land in the hands of needy children in Mexico, but Samaritan's Purse reaches over 100 different countries. Last year they distributed over 11 million shoeboxes collectively. I have heard some awesome stories this week while working. There are accounts of children who were unable to attend school because they had no pencils---until their shoebox was given to them last Christmas. One child was barred from school because she had no socks to wear with her shoes. Her shoebox contained several pair for her. In this materialistic world we know, it's humbling to learn of children who have never received anything until receiving their box. There was an African woman who had small children. Her young ones were so happy when they were each given a box. She, excitedly, went through the contents with each of them and when she got to the bottom of the last box she couldn't believe her eyes. The person who had prepared the box had included a personal photo and a letter. The photo was the woman's own aunt. Decades earlier, their family had been split apart and an aunt had disappeared and was believed dead. Not only did the woman now have a picture of her aunt, but proof that she was living, even though divided by counties.
In this season of Thanksgiving, we are again reminded that we have so much for which to be thankful.