Operation Christmas Child is one of the most recognized services that is provided for lower socioeconomic children all around the world at Christmastime.
Samaritan’s Purse is the organization that leads this program. The president of Samaritan’s Purse, Franklin Graham, started the program in 1993, after being asked by a man in England if he’d be willing to fill shoeboxes with gifts for children in Eastern Europe. For Christmas in 1993, Samaritan’s Purse sent 28,000 shoebox gifts to children in the Balkans.
Every year since, Samaritan’s Purse has collected shoeboxes filled with gifts, toys, school supplies, and hygiene items for children around the world. Since 1993, more than 232 million children in more than 170 countries and territories have received an Operation Christmas Child shoebox.
The boxes not only deliver joy for the kids, but Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian organization, wants to give each child a “tangible expression of God’s love.”
Tens of thousands of volunteers from churches all around the world partner with Samaritan’s Purse to put the boxes together for shipment. It has become a well-known Christmas tradition around the world.