OPENING ACTIVITY: Best Gift Ever!

As students gather for this week’s lesson, ask them to talk about the best gift they have ever received at Christmas from family or friends. Then ask them how they thanked the giver of that gift.

Close your time of discussion by saying, “Let’s find out how giving simple gifts helps children and families around the world experience God’s love.”

OPENING STORY: [Read aloud or pass out copies for students to read]

OPERATION CHRISTMAS CHILD CELEBRATES 25 YEARS

“When I agreed to send shoebox gifts to Bosnia in 1993, I never dreamed it would grow into the project it is today,” Franklin Graham says on the official Operation Christmas Child website. “We praise God for allowing us to touch the lives of so many children and their families with the Gospel of Jesus Christ over the past 25 years. Since 1993, Samaritan’s Purse has partnered with local churches around the world to deliver 157 million Operation Christmas Child shoebox gifts to children in need in 160 countries.”

When donating, packing, and shipping the simple, shoebox-sized gifts, local volunteers also benefit from their experience. “It’s good for us humans to spend a few hours of your time to help the lives of others,” said volunteer Kynnick Christofferson, age 12, of West Burlington, Iowa. “We are sharing, we are helping, we are always there for each other.”

“It makes me feel like I’m giving other people hope, to push through,” said Brynn Casady, 15, of Burlington as he prepped boxes that include school supplies, common hygiene items, and gifts like toys, shoes, and jackets.

Leesa Bates, who heads the local collection effort in Coweta, Georgia, said, “I love kids. Everything I do is for the kids…they’re our future.” Bates reflected on the opportunity to touch a child’s life through sending a box. “I really can’t afford to go to a third-world country and help, but I can give of my time,” she said.

“We are honored to be linking arms with our community to help children around the world experience the true meaning of Christmas,” said regional director David Zimmerman in Huntington, West Virginia. “These simple gifts show God’s love to children facing difficult circumstances.”

“Boys and girls are coming to Christ and leading their families to follow Him,” reports the Operation Christmas Child website. “Many help plant churches, and new generations of evangelists are rising up through The Greatest Journey, a discipleship program just for shoebox recipients.”

One Christmas, an 8-year-old girl named Felisha on the island of Trinidad received a shoebox gift packed with a doll, stationery, colorful socks, and a teddy bear. “I didn’t know anything about Jesus because I had never been to church before, so I was really curious,” Felisha said.

As a result of her shoebox gift, she began attending church in a neighboring village with a friend. When her sister received a shoebox gift a following year, her father said, “I was amazed at the love I saw in those boxes.” Since then, each member of their family has accepted Christ as their personal Savior. Together, they worked to plant a church in their hometown—aptly named “Hardbargain.”

Felisha knows that her shoebox was more than a collection of toys and useful items: “It made me learn about God, it helped start this church, and it changed my life.” Felisha is among countless children whose lives have been changed forever through the power of God’s love demonstrated through simple gifts.

The history of the shoeboxes begins in war-torn Bosnia in the Balkan states of eastern Europe. During the summer of 1993, Graham received a call from a man in England asking his help on behalf of children in Bosnia who were suffering because of the brutal civil war.

The Englishman specifically asked for shoeboxes filled with gifts to deliver to these little ones at Christmas. Samaritan’s Purse was already working in Bosnia, and Graham had been there three times in the previous year, so he was eager to help.

Christmas, however, seemed a long way off, so he put this request aside. Not long before Thanksgiving, he received a call back from the man in England. Quickly reminded of his promise, Franklin assured him he was working on it.

Graham then called his friend, the late Ross Rhoads, who was serving as senior pastor of Calvary Church in Charlotte, North Carolina. He asked if Ross and his wife Carol could fill a shoebox with items for a child, show it to their congregation, and ask them to do the same—in order to share the true meaning of Christmas with the children of Bosnia.

Ross and Carol were eager to assist, and the response was overwhelming. Shortly after Thanksgiving, Ross called Graham to report that 11,000 shoebox gifts were now lining the hallways of his church!

Combining these gifts with more from their Canadian office, Samaritan’s Purse sent 28,000 shoebox gifts to children in Bosnia that Christmas. Ross and Carol Rhoads traveled to the war-torn nation to help distribute them.

Today, through the countless prayers of many and the service of thousands of volunteers around the globe, the project has grown to include eight shoebox-packing countries in addition to the 160 countries that have received them in Africa, Asia, Europe, Central America, and South America.

Now have your class form small groups to discuss their answers to these questions.

• How have the gifts of Operation Christmas Child changed children, families, and communities?

• When have you requested and received a life-changing gift?

• When have you found an opportunity to share the gift of God’s love to a person in need?

News Sources:
https://www.samaritanspurse.org/article/celebrating-25-years-of-giving-shoebox-gifts-to-children-in-need/
http://www.herald-dispatch.com/features_entertainment/local-families-can-make-impact-through-operation-christmas-child/article_138a4bc6-c3e5-529c-b69a-d882952d9963.html
http://www.thehawkeye.com/news/20181022/shoeboxes-full-of-heart-warming-gifts-for-operation-christmas-child
http://times-herald.com/news/2018/10/operation-christmas-child-aiming-for-20-000-boxes-locally