HOULTON, Maine — Another November at First Baptist Church meant another exciting “Packing Party” for Operation Christmas Child, a project of Samaritan’s Purse.
For 17 years the church has been participating in this worthwhile project of bringing a little Christmas spirit to children literally around the world.
A staggering statistic is that over 100 million boxes have been distributed to needy children since this project began 20 years ago. Last year in this country 110,000 volunteers handled 6.5 million shoe boxes at 3,518 collection sites and seven processing centers.
Jennifer Sylvester and Rachel Good co-chaired this project and on Sunday, Nov. 10 children and adults alike gathered around the six groaning tables of colorful hygiene products, toys, clothing and school supplies in Fellowship Hall and began filling red and green shoe boxes for children from ages 2-14. By the time the dust settled an hour later, 102 boxes were bursting with Christmas joy for a child somewhere and the children at the church were equally excited at the prospect of a child like themselves opening their box.
Each box must be checked over carefully to make sure the essential items made it in along with a $7 check for shipping. Once this was done all boxes were dedicated during morning worship on Nov. 17 and then driven to Presque Isle for their eventual trip south to North Carolina and their ultimate journey into the hands of a child in one of 150 countries around the world.
“It is easy to picture the joy on a child’s face as they open a box just for them and that keeps us doing this year after year,” said Sylvester.
People can start even now collecting items for next year — find the sales and tuck things away. It is a beautiful thing to put a smile on a child’s face.
