An OCC Thanksgiving Story

Last Monday evening our Operation Christmas Child area team met at Chick-fil-A to celebrate the end of National Collection Week.  Little did we know, but God had more boxes to add to that collection.  Before I even got a chance to order my chicken sandwich my phone rang.  It was Cindy, our relay center coordinator in Conneaut Lake, calling to tell me they'd received another load of boxes.  We agreed it was a good problem to have.

After conferring with Seph, our Erie collection center coordinator, it was decided that Cindy and her husband, John, would drive the boxes to Erie and we'd meet her at the collection center at 8:00 PM.

Cindy and John arrived right on time and opened the back of their vehicle.  It was full of stacked GO boxes.  As we started to unload, they told us the story behind them.

That evening they were only scheduled to collect boxes from 5-6 PM, and since they'd already delivered their main load of boxes to the collection center, they were actually hoping for no more than a few stragglers.

Imagine their surprise when a woman arrived with her two daughters and a vehicle full of boxes.  Cindy and John asked her what church the boxes were coming from and the woman explained that these were personal boxes from their family.

She went on to say that they don't have an actual house to live in right now.  They are living in the "milking house" attached to the goat barn.  They had two goats and God blessed them and multiplied their 'herd' (is that what you call a group of goats?) to a total of 53.  Because they'd experienced God's blessing they wanted to give back by packing all 188 of these boxes themselves to bless children around the world.

I'm not farm savvy, but John explained to me that a milking house doesn't have heat and that this family obviously has many needs of their own.   John was so touched and amazed by their gift and said, "This makes it all worthwhile."

I'd say that family knows how to be thankful, wouldn't you?  And their gratitude is being passed along to change the lives of children around the world.

Those children will then be filled with gratitude.  And the gift of thanksgiving goes on....