A small city

Nearly 8 million shoe box gifts have been packed, dropped at local collection sites, processed at one of six Operation Christmas Child processing centers, and shipped to 130 countries around the world. Poor children in Mexico, South America, Africa, Asia, Europe and the Middle East -- children who have likely never received a Christmas gift before -- will unwrap those colorful boxes and, hopefully, know they are loved.

That is a lot of boxes. It is a lot of wrapping paper. And toothbrushes. And stuffed animals.

It is a lot of time. The Denver Processing Center warehouse ran nonstop 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day but Sunday for 3 weeks. Close to 7,000 volunteers processed nearly 630,000 shoe box gifts in Denver alone, inspecting and cartonizing box after box for a total of 182 hours.

Operation Christmas Child is big. I am continually amazed at the scope of this project. As our director's husband put it: Setting up and running a processing center is like setting up and running a small city. That 65,000-square-foot space needs sanitation and waste services. It needs heat, water, food facilities, technology, phone systems, fire protection, shipping services, security and communication systems. Not to mention leadership and staff.

And yet, Operation Christmas Child is also small. What's the good of setting up a city if it can't positively impact society? Operation Christmas Child is nothing without each and every individual who packs a shoe box, wraps it, prays for the child who will receive it, and trusts it to our stewardship.

That fact humbled me every day I worked for Operation Christmas Child. I never grew tired of watching one more shoe box come in the door. I never grew tired of a child's wide-eyed wonder as he brought in a box and saw where it would go next. That box became more than cardboard and small toys. It became precious cargo and would soon become precious treasure.

Now, as I write this, the contents of the warehouse have been packed up and shipped out. It stands empty. The full-time staff have returned to the old office. I have returned home, soon to pursue another adventure in the wylds of Montana.

But, the vision of Operation Christmas Child continues. Nearly 8 million kids -- along with their families and their villages -- know Jesus loves them and desires a relationship with them. And that truly is the greatest gift of all, worth every second of work in a small city that flourished and is now gone...til next year.


Some of my Wyoming friends help demonstrate the enormity of an Operation Christmas Child banner. When I look at this picture, I am glad I was part of an "A" in this year's mission.

Even though I saw an exorbitant amount of boxes and tape and rubber bands and people in these five months of working for Operation Christmas Child, one of my greatest delights remained in packing my own four boxes. Here I am dropping my gifts at the Processing Center. I hope to meet the kids who received them some day -- here on earth or in heaven.