Item of interest

VBC breaks its Operation Christmas Child record

Village Bible Church recently broke its record of supporting Operation Christmas Child by sending 420 Christmas Shoe Boxes to Dallas for distribution to children in countries affected by war, poverty, natural disaster, famine, and disease, and to children living on Native American reservations in the U.S., according to a VBC news release.

In 2014, VBC sent 170 boxes filled with gifts for children to the Dallas distribution center. By 2018, the number of boxes distributed from VBC had grown to 313. VBC exceeded its goal for 2019 for 400 boxes, the release said.

The boxes are filled with gender and age-appropriate gifts, ages 2 to 14. For example, the tool belts were made and filled with tools, such as hammers and screwdrivers, for a male teenager.

The world's largest Christmas project of its kind, Operation Christmas Child uses gift-filled shoe boxes to "demonstrate God's love in a tangible way to children in need around the world. With each box the child is given a book, 'The Greatest Gift,' the story of Jesus. The book is the tool used to open the hearts of children and their parents. In 2018, over 11 million boxes were gifted in over 100 countries," the release said.

The program was started in the United Kingdom in 1990 by Dave and Jill Cooke. Three years after this beginning, the Wales-based shoe box gift project merged in a partnership with Samaritan's Purse, "allowing us to share 20 years of expertise in relief and aid work with the project, and expand the reach of the shoe box gifts to more than 28,000 children that year. Since 1993, Operation Christmas Child has delivered gift-filled shoe boxes to over 168 million children in more than 100 countries," it said.

Society on 11/18/2019

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