Using “God’s Money” to Bless Children

West Shore church contributed more than 1,000 filled shoeboxes to Operation Christmas Child this year, but you probably don’t realize that 63 of those were contributed by just one person … and she’s only 13 years old.

Abigail Gunning developed a heart for Operation Christmas Child when she heard a very moving story about a girl in need of a pair of shoes and receiving those shoes in an Operation Christmas Child shoebox.  Abigail wanted to bless children in similar ways so she has been faithfully participating in the shoebox project for about five years.

When Abigail receives money at Christmas, birthdays, or an occasional opportunity to earn money assisting her mother with a cleaning job, she designates a certain portion of it as “God’s money.”  She used “God’s money” to purchase the items she placed in her shoeboxes, beginning last summer with the “Back to School” sales.  At first, she purchased enough supplies and contributed her own Beanie Babies to fill 20 boxes, but she kept adding to her supplies and ended up filling 63 shoeboxes which she then carefully, lovingly and joyfully packed into three large Operation Christmas Child shipping boxes.

Abigail plans to collect supplies all next year for even more shoeboxes.  Her goal is to fill 100 next Christmas.  A dream of hers is to be able to hand-deliver her shoeboxes to the children in other countries who will receive them.  It wouldn’t surprise us at all if God honors her heart and grants her that dream someday.