From the Samaritan's Purse website:
Mission Statement
Samaritan’s Purse is a nondenominational evangelical Christian organization providing spiritual and physical aid to hurting people around the world. Since 1970, Samaritan’s Purse has helped meet needs of people who are victims of war, poverty, natural disasters, disease, and famine with the purpose of sharing God’s love through His Son, Jesus Christ. The organization serves the church worldwide to promote the Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ.
They provide assistance to people in need around the world. By responding to natural disaster sites, war torn environments, and more, they are able to share the Good News to hurting men, women, and children. They help people rebuild, give medical care, work with wounded US veterans and their spouses, train people to care for animals and plants to provide food and a livelihood to individuals and their neighbors, greatly improving their quality of life. And really, that's just a small sample of the many things Samaritan's Purse does.
Operation Christmas Child is a ministry that reaches kids ages 2-14 around the world. With the gift of a shoebox, the door is opened for the eternal gift of the gospel. Children receive a gift, prayerfully and lovingly packed by other children, families, and churches. Items packed generally include school supplies (paper, pencils, crayons, coloring books), hygiene items (soap, washcloths, tooth brushes), clothing (a shirt, socks, underpants, shoes), and toys (a slinky, whistle, cards, dolls, soccer ball with pump).
We've packed shoeboxes almost every year since the bigger littles were baby punks. It's part of what we do each fall now and I think they would be pretty disappointed if they didn't get to choose toys and games to include in each box. We go through our stash of small toys, tools, games, and gadgets and pack items in each box very intentionally.
Some items are more expensive than others, but there are often sales on most items you might want. I never imagined I could afford soccer balls and pumps for boxes, but I found a sale last year for $2.50 for real soccer balls. Then I shopped around for inexpensive, but sturdy, ball pumps. I've purchased small fleece blankets (originally $5, on sale for $2.50 or less) and with some creative folding, rolling, and packing, they are easy to fit in a shoebox without displacing other important items. Sometimes, a great toy assortment or small stuffed animals become reasonably priced. I don't get "cheap" toys, but rather items at a good price. I figure, if my punks would break a toy in ten minutes, a lot of other punks would break the toy in ten minutes. There's no fun in broken toys.
It's just as much fun to pack for older children as it is for the littles. I like getting to put a bit more thought into what a 13 year old might be interested in as opposed to a six year old. I've included small tool kits for boys and crochet hooks and yarn for girls. Somewhere, on the great wide interwebs, once upon a time, I found crochet instructions with NO WORDS, so no language barrier. In just pictures, girls can learn to crochet basic items. The source of that document is no longer on the internet, but it has me thinking of other things that can be taught in photos.
We make purchases year round. It makes it a lot easier to pack more boxes without a big expense all at once. I don't follow the Samaritan's Purse shopping schedule; I just purchase whatever I see on sale (shoes, clothes, toys, and school supplies) at the end of the season, then add washcloths, soap, and toothbrushes. This year, I had so many little girls' shoes, and shirts for both boys and girls I was able to pass them on to a church to include in their boxes. I had thought about keeping some for next year, when I heard the Slugs & Bugs Sing the Bible version of Matthew 6:19-21 and Luke 3:11 decided to get them sent out this year. I know I'll find more bargains for next fall.
Another great feature of the Operation Christmas Child ministry is that we can track our shoeboxes. By paying the reasonable shipping fee online, we can print labels for our boxes which can be scanned and we are emailed the country of the box's final destination. Some years, all of our boxes go to the same country and other years we've had boxes head to as many as four different countries. Only once have we not found out where our box went and we learned it went to a "hard to reach" area. This means the final destination can't be revealed for safety reasons. I imagine that may be one of the places of greatest need for the gospel message.
Check out Samaritan's Purse to see what happens to a shoebox as it travels from your home to a child in need somewhere in the world.
Find drop off locations and times for your area.
#ipackedashoebox
No comments:
Post a Comment