Operation Christmas Child is one of my favorite charities.
It's also one of the best ones to involve your children in.
Now, we've done quite a few things as a family: Rice Bowls, Bangor Area Homeless Shelter, serving meals at Manna, raking leaves for the elderly, GROUP mission trips, Shoes for Orphan's Souls, Walk for Life, Compassion & more...
However, there is something very, very special about packing a simple shoebox for a kid the same age as you are. You know what you would like, so you buy it & pray that it is handed to a little boy or girl with maybe your same interests.
If you are unfamiliar with Operation Christmas Child, by all means, check them out. They are a ministry of Samaritan's Purse. Shoeboxes are filled with goodies & delivered to kids all over the world. When you fill your shoebox, you choose "boy" or "girl" and an age category: 2-4; 5-9; or 10-14.
The first time we ever, ever filled a shoebox for Operation Christmas Child was when Noelle was 2 years old. I'm not sure how much she understood, but as I mentioned, of all the possibly charities, I feel like a child can imagine what another child would like! So, that first year, we filled one box for a 2-year old girl.
We continued to do that for a few years, filling a box for a girl Noelle's age & a box for a boy Micah's age.
Our boxes typically have:
scissors
pencils/crayons/colored pencils/pencil sharpener
notebook
gluestick & extra erasers
hair things for girls
hard candy
toothbrush & toothpaste
comb
Then~ toys: cars, balls, crafts, etc.
I actually try not to get "dollar store" toys because I really do want toys that will be somewhat durable & last & bring joy. But we've purchased plenty of dollar store items as well.
I received a bit of a wake-up call when Noelle turned 6. She has a June birthday as she invited a good portion of her Kindergarten class to her party. It was sweet & fun. However, I felt sick about all those presents. Seriously~ just sick. It was the first & only time we would have a rather large party with presents. There isn't anything necessarily wrong with getting lots of presents, but it was oppressively excessive to me. I decided that we needed to make a change & do things differently.
So... the year that Micah turned 6 & Noelle turned 8 & D turned 9, we had 3 birthday parties, but we asked their friends to please bring items for Operation Christmas Child shoeboxes & not presents for them. And we meant it. By this time the kids were very familiar with OCC & were very receptive to the fact that they had everything they needed. Some children didn't. It made perfect sense to "give up" presents for kids who needed it more than they did. There was very little balking from the kids & I am oh, so glad that we did it.
We had the kids open their presents & ooh & ahh, even though the gifts were for OCC & not for them.
We liked the "Birthday for Operation Christmas Child" idea so much that we did it again, for 6 birthday parties worth of shoebox items! I do believe that it is time to do it again! And you know, this exercise was so good for the kids & really helped them appreciate what they have.
All of this led up to our Samaritan's Purse Christmas, which we had a couple of years ago. I am not sharing this to brag, I am sharing it because these types of things: Shoebox Birthdays and Samaritan's Purse Christmases, these are possible for all of us! A good cause & one kids can relate to & besides that, It is so good for them! Any way you can take a me-me-me cultural norm of gimme, gimme, gimme and turn that into giving to the Lord & others~ it's a good thing!
At least a couple of years ahead of time, the kids knew that we would be "giving up" our Christmas for Samaritan's Purse. We had practiced, so to speak, with our birthdays. It's a lot harder to "give up" Christmas, but we were ready.
This meant:
~No gifts from parents, grandparents, aunts or uncles.
(exceptions to the rule: Our kids are in a blended family, so of course they received gifts from their other parents. Also, we did do stockings, our favorite part!)
~No purchased, perfect-looking Christmas tree.
~No special food treats.
All of this $ would be pooled & given to Samaritan's Purse.
I am really pleased with the cooperation we received from family, and of course from the kids.
The kids had stuffed-full stockings. And they were plenty & enough.
They enjoyed spending their time with playdoh & family games &
outside in our own make-believe world: Narnibithia!
Opening presents of $ was still fun.
Counting our $ was fun too!
We ended up with over $700 to give!!!
It was so much fun to go through the catalog & decide how to "spend" our money!
Each of the kids wrote a list of how they wanted to spend their portion.
Just today, Micah mentioned to me how he had helped pay for a well & how important clean drinking water is. We chose hot meals & teacher supplies & stocking a fish pond & chickens!
Christmas 2011 was one we will always, always, cherish.
So tonight I packed my three meager shoeboxes.
And it seems so small.
Maybe because it's not a "whole Christmas" or it's not a dozen boxes, which we sometimes have had. Even so, Noelle wants to pray over each one before I take them to church. I know that each one will be a blessing to some girl or boy.
I am thankful for Operation Christmas Child.
So simple.
But such a meaningful part of our lives.
I pray that we will live with our minds, ears & eyes wide open, looking for ways to give.
I pray that we will live with our hands open, loosely grasping the things of this world.
I pray that we will see the world through God's eyes, and live accordingly.
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