Operation Christmas Child, an initiative of the Christian humanitarian organization Samaritan’s Purse, has distributed 11.2 million shoeboxes to impoverished children this year, breaking its previous record.
The organization, led by Franklin Graham who is president of Samaritan’s Purse, made even more of an impact on those in need this Christmas season.
Graham, along with Fox News host Greta Van Susteren, traveled to Belize and Haiti this week to deliver the shoeboxes filled with gifts to children in need.
“We want every child to know they are precious and loved by God, and these shoeboxes help accomplish that,” Graham wrote on his Facebook page. “Let me tell you, there were a whole lot of smiles and laughter from these children who live in a very poor area of the country.”
Shoeboxes filled with gifts such as toothbrushes, socks, toys, and school supplies will be handed out this week in over 130 countries worldwide. The shoeboxes are packed by ordinary citizens in the U.S. and other countries.
Operation Christmas Child Domestic Director Randy Riddle told The Christian Post that the organization has surpassed its goal of receiving 8.6 million shoeboxes from people in the U.S. The organization has also received shoeboxes from Australia, Finland, Germany, Japan, New Zealand, Canada, Spain, and the United Kingdom.
photo I, Briho
“We give God the glory for a record-breaking year of Operation Christmas Child,” said Riddle. “We really believe that His hand is on this movement worldwide. The bible says the gift opens the way for the giver. We use these gifts by delivering them through the local Evangelical church in 130 countries worldwide. Our partners who are pastors deliver these gifts to the neediest children in their countries. To a child that has never received a gift before, the simplest gifts mean the world.”
The numbers have been shocking. Back in Thanksgiving, there was over “2.4 million of the shoeboxes—packed with toys, school supplies and hygiene items—are arriving at the Charlotte Processing Center to get ready for a journey around the world.”
photo Alyson Jones
Jordyn McNeal, a nine-year-old girl from Alabama, is heading to Atlanta to drop-off more than 1,500 shoeboxes filled with toys, school supplies and hygiene items—the results of a giving challenge she created to get other youth involved in helping kids around the world.
Jordyn’s gifts will join more than 1.5 million shoeboxes that are arriving this season at the Atlanta processing center to get ready for a journey around the world.
Atheists have attacked connections to the Operation Christmas Child campaign at schools and military facilities. The South Carolina threats in 2013 cut ties with a elementary school’s voluntary handing out of the packages and last year, the Air Force fought to keep the collection at the Dover base, more on that HERE
