The Best Present

The Christmas holidays bring many traditions to our families. Year after year, we celebrate this blessed and festive season by repeating these precious traditions. Some have been passed down to us from our parents and grandparents. Others are new ones that we create. Don and I have so many memories of the traditions our family of 5 celebrated every year….decorating the tree, baking cookies, making the kids wait at the top of the stairs on Christmas morning as their father made his coffee. But the one that I found the most meaningful was the packing of the Operation Christmas Child boxes for Samaritan’s Purse. Since 1993, more than 188 million Operation Christmas Child gift-filled shoeboxes have been distributed to children in more than 170 countries! 

 From the earliest Christmas that I can recall, we packed these OCC boxes with our children. First we let them choose the gender and age group for the child they wanted to bless. Then we took them shopping for items to fill the box. We purchased fun things like stuffed animals, toys, crayons, coloring books, stickers, jump ropes, and so much more. We also purchased needed items like soap, toothpaste, and a toothbrush. We placed each item in the box until it was filled. And then, we packed every available space left with candy, candy and more candy (which is now discouraged… and living in the hot African climate, I understand why they made this change!). On the top of the items, our children placed a letter and their photo for the child who would receive it. We even included our home address, hopeful that one day we might get a letter back! We put the lid on the box, taped it down for extra security, and wrapped the shoebox in bright, festive Christmas paper. Finally, we prayed for the child who would receive the box. The boxes were taken to our local church and shipped to the Samaritan’s Purse headquarters where they were distributed all over the world. 

 This family tradition has been taken up by my daughter and her husband who now pack OCC boxes with their children. I am so happy they do this. I loved the thought of giving joy to a child that we would never meet. I loved knowing that these boxes showed the child someone, somewhere out there in this big world loved them. I loved knowing that these boxes shared the joy of Christmas with a child. I loved knowing that each box also shared with a child the love of their Father in sending His only Son to be born in a stable and who would one day save all of mankind. 

 When we moved to Mozambique, one of my first thoughts was how great it would be to be on the receiving end of this OCC tradition. For years, we packed and sent off boxes. Now that I was in Africa, I could have the experience of passing out the boxes and seeing with my own eyes the joy of the children as they received them. I wrote an email to Samaritan’s Purse explaining who we were and requesting to receive OCC shoeboxes to distribute to the children with whom we work. I received a response saying that they were not distributing shoeboxes in Mozambique that year. Okay… 

 Not be deterred, I emailed Samaritan’s Purse the following year and got the same response. So I emailed again the following year… and the year after that and the year after that. I continued these emails for the next 9 years and finally realized that they were not coming to Mozambique, so I gave up. Wouldn’t you know that that very year, I saw posts from fellow missionaries here in Mozambique on Facebook and guess what they were doing…passing out OCC shoeboxes. WHAT?!?!?! The very first year I did not contact Samaritan’s Purse was the very first year they did actually distribute in Mozambique!!! I immediately got the contact information of the local representative and set a plan in action to ensure that our children would receive boxes the next year. 

 In July, our program administrator, Delcio, and our Sunshine House mothers who run our community children’s projects, Zelda, Ilda, and Catarina, all were to attend a full day seminar that would instruct them on the program and how to present not only the OCC shoeboxes to the children, but also how to present the story of why Jesus came along with a call to pray and accept Him as Lord of their lives. At the end of the training session, they would bring back the boxes for the 63 children in our care. BUT as fate would have it, the day before they were to attend, the president of Mozambique imposed new Covid restrictions that again shut down gatherings of any group of people larger than 15. I was beyond disappointed! The boxes were within my grasp and then ripped right out of it! 

 In September, the Covid restrictions were again relaxed and Delcio and our ladies were able to attend the training session. They brought back not only 63 OCC shoeboxes but also Portuguese Bibles and Portuguese Bible lesson books for children! THANK YOU SAMARITAN’S PURSE! Each child would also received a booklet entitled, “The Best Present”. It has been my joy to come upon our children reading this book in their homes on their own. We now had all we need to bless and train up our children.

In November, we ran the program with our children who live in our Sunshine Houses and with our three Beacons of Light community projects. The program began with the story of the fall of Adam and Eve and God's promise to send a Savor and continued through to the birth, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. 

The program ended with a call to prayer. 

After this, the children were each given a shoebox. 

They were asked to not open it until everyone had received their box. They sat so very patiently. 

I looked at their little faces and realized that they had no idea what joy they were about to open. These children come from very impoverished families. They rarely, if ever, receive a present. They had no clue what was in the box they were holding. Little did they know it was stuffed with carefully selected treats that were prayed over just for them. They were in for a big big surprise. 

 After all the children received their boxes, we led them in a prayer for the people who packed and sent the boxes. 

 After the final “Amen”, we told them they could open their boxes on the count of 3. We counted 1- 2- 3 and they opened the boxes. Their eyes immediately went wide as they took in the sight. 

They began pulling out the items one by one, showing them to us and their friends. The excitement grew and grew as they pulled out more and more gifts. 

There were so many gifts that we had to work very hard to get them all packed in again when the children headed home. Some boxes had photos of the families, groups and individuals who packed them. Some boxes had letters or cards. 

But there was one box only that had an address offering the chance to connect back with the sender. Little Wesley had this box. 

It was sent from a girl named Amber who lived in Pennsylvania, not far from where I grew up! I asked Wesley if I could borrow the note to send a thank you email to the person who sent his box. He graciously accepted. I was so excited to connect with a sender and sent off an email to Amber that very night, along with photos of Wesley and his shoebox. I was surprised to not get back an immediate reply, and over time, I had forgotten about it. 

A month passed by until I saw an email in my inbox from her. I excitedly opened it to discover it was not from her, but from her mother. I was stunned as I read her words… 

 Thank you so much for your email to Amber. I'm her mom and we tragically lost our daughter in April of this year at 14. Your email came at a time when we desperately needed some encouragement and to see her handwritten note. God certainly knew the timing. We're so glad that you chose to respond and we will treasure these photos. :) 

 My husband and I are Area Coordinators for Operation Christmas Child Allegheny County in Pennsylvania and we've also been packing boxes for 12-13 years. Amber and our 11 year old son have grown up packing so they really don't know what it would be like to not have Operation Christmas Child in their lives. I remember Amber talking about the particular box that Wesley is holding. She packed it at a packing party we had that year. She always loved fitting in as many items as possible and really enjoyed the challenge of fitting in large stuffed animals. One of us also made the bracelet that she chose to send in that box. We've always taken time to make jewelry for our own boxes each year as well as the packing parties that we are a part of. 

 Again, thank you for your email. God used it to help carry us through our collection season this year in order to help pack over 600 boxes at our packing party and to help facilitate the sending of over 13,000 shoeboxes from our county this year. We pray that each of the recipients will be blessed and will come to know Christ as their Saviour if they do not already. We'll continue to pray for little Wesley and for all the children that you and your husband are blessed to serve through your company. 

 This was not at all what I was expecting! Even now, I don’t even know how to process this. My heart aches for this family. I wrote back an email to this mother expressing my sorrow for her loss and my appreciation for her note to me. I now understand why this Amber’s note made it to my hands…out of all the other thousands of hands it could have landed in any country around the world. Unlike the many unanswered notes my children and I had sent over the years, Amber’s note arrived in hands capable of writing back. The email response that her note prompted was never meant for her eyes. All along, God had a plan. He knew that her parents needed this note and that it would bring them comfort as they grieved the loss of their daughter. 

If you take a look, this photo I took of Wesley shows him holding the bracelet that Amber had lovingly made. I remember him pulling it out of the box and showing it to me. Of all the items in that box, he was the most drawn to this handmade bracelet. He knew how special it was. And now her family knows it ended up with a very appreciative little boy. 

 As I celebrate Christmas this year, my heart is full of appreciation and joy for all of the people who make the Operation Christmas Child program a success. My family’s Christmas tradition of packing these boxes has now come full circle...and Samaritan’s Purse will not be getting any more email requests from that persistent, crazy lady in Mozambique who refuses to give up! At least for a few years. Their goal is that every child will receive a box once in their lifetime. So I will have to wait until we have all new children in our community projects to have this program again…but as soon as we do, they will be hearing from me!

PROJECT SUNSHINE...THE DAWN OF A NEW WAY

In July 2021, we took on this cute little guy, Ivan, along with his older brother, Dario, and sister, Anabela. My recent blog,"They Are Worth It All" https://sunshineinafrica.blogspot.com/, shares the story of their homecoming with our foundation. 

My writing today is not as much about Ivan as it is about the desperate medical needs of so many people here in Mozambique. Ivan has gross motor skills deficiencies making it cumbersome for him to walk and run properly. He literally does not bend his hips or knees when he walks. We have taken him to doctors for a diagnosis as to why he walks this way. There is no physical cause for this, so we have been advised to take him for physical therapy to teach him to walk correctly. 

We have pursued this therapy through the public health care system. Ivan goes every Tuesday and Thursday for an “appointment” at the local Provincial Hospital. I put the word appointment in quotation marks because it really is not an appointment. Consults of any kind in Mozambique are first come, first serve. Because of this, everyone arrives very early at the hospitals and clinics so that they have a chance of seeing a doctor before the day’s end. By early, I mean very early…as in the wee hours of the day before the clinic even opens. It has broken my heart in the past to drive by clinics and see scores and scores of men, women, and children lined up outside waiting. Then you drive by hours later and still see them there…waiting. There are not enough doctors and nurses to meet the need, and many will go home unattended at the end of the day. 

My first experiences with people’s medical struggles came with several medical teams we hosted to conduct outreaches. We would set up our tables and chairs and then they would come…by the hundreds. They lined up and sat on the ground. After a while, so many had come that there no longer was a line, but a sea of people sitting patiently on the ground. Each one hoped to see the doctor. Each one hoped to get a medication that would cure them. But all we were able to do was put a “Band-Aid” on their illness. We could give them a medication that made them feel better for that day or the next week, but there would be no one to follow up and continue their treatment. I remember looking down the line of people in plastic chairs. They all had such hope in their eyes. Inside, I cried for them. I knew we could only do so much, and that wasn’t very much at all. 

At one medical outreach, the sun was setting and people were still coming! We had to put a grass mat over the door to stop more people from entering. We would not be able to take any other patients that day. All these people who walked for miles to seek attention would now have to turn around and walk home again in the dark. 

At another medical outreach, when the end of the day came, there were still hundreds of people sitting under the shade of a very large tree who had been waiting all day. Our tireless doctor has diagnosed and treated hundreds, but it did not make a dent in the need. When it was announced that we would not be able to see any more people that day, there were no complaints or murmurs. They had been in this situation countless times before. They all quietly got up and made their way home. 

At the end of our third medical team outreach, I swore I would never do another medical outreach like this again. They didn’t solve or help anything, and they left me feeling that there had to be a better way. 

Now I find myself in a public hospital setting right outside the capital city with Ivan. You would think the situation would be better here, but I see the same thing. There are hundreds of people lined up on chairs in the waiting room, lining the walls of the halls, sitting side by side along the courtyard…so much for social distancing.

We take Ivan to the Physical Therapy section of the hospital. It is the same situation there with people lined up in chairs with their crutches and others in wheelchairs and then there were those, like us, who arrived too late to snag a chair, leaning against the walls…and we wait and we wait and we wait.

Eventually an attendant comes out and collects the medical cards that each patient has placed in the box outside the door. One by one, names are called and people start to go in. After about an hour, Ivan’s name is called. We go in but all of the doctors are busy, so Ivan is told to go through the series of exercises he has been taught. He dutifully performs his squats...

 ...and goes up and down a set of stairs over and over until he tires out....

He then goes to the back room where he practices walking between two bars while watching himself in the mirror to check his posture. 

At one point, his doctor does come to check in on him. She clearly has more patients than time. So, she gives him an encouraging word about how well he did today and tells him she will see him next week. 

Almost 3 hours had passed since we entered the hospital, and we now found ourselves leaving without any real interaction with a doctor. As we left, the hundreds of people are still filling the chairs of the main waiting room and lining the halls of the corridors and courtyards. It appeared just as crowded as it was when we entered earlier. 

I have even experienced such patient endurance myself in the private sector. I called to make an appointment with a doctor at the private hospital. When I asked for an appointment time, I was told to come at 8:00 am. I arrived at 7:45 to a corridor lined with people. Apparently, the doctor begins seeing patients at 8:00; it wasn’t that I had an appointment at 8:00. So, I took my place in the last chair. For the next few hours, I moved along with the others advancing from chair to chair to chair as each person went into the examining room. I finally had my turn at 11:45! 

So, why do I share all of this? This all points to the next step in our work here in Mozambique. It is the main reason Don and I came 10 years ago. We came to implement Project Sunshine...a holistic approach to come alongside the cashew farmers and provide a better life for them and their families. As we head out into the villages to begin Project Sunshine, we hope to provide must needed relief for people. Here is a link to a video that best explains it all... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qEEmM-_tVQA&t=8s  Attached to each mini-factory in the villages, we will provide a transformation center where people can easily access the help they need right where they live. They will not have to travel long distances walking under the hot Africa sun or on overstuffed transports to get to a clinic where they will wait with all the crowds of other people who also have travelled from all over to receive medical attention. This is the Sunshine Approach. A model that will alleviate the suffering of people in remote areas and give them a hands-up to a better life and a brighter future for them and their children. This is why we gave up everything to come to Mozambique. We are very excited to finally get this project underway, and we are excited to take you with us along the way. We will be sure to keep you updated on progress!