The Fellowship of the Cross youth would like to thank our church family for the joy to the world, and faith in Jesus, you are sharing through your generous Operation Christmas Child donations.
Your Christmas in July contributions have allowed us to make major strides toward our goal of filling at least 100 shoe boxes this year. FOTC has led OCC drives that have provided more than 1,700 boxes over the past 15 years. Church family has filled 100 or more boxes for 14 consecutive years. Your contributions have helped us reach children in Thailand and Ukraine, as well as multiple nations in Africa, South America, Central America, and the Caribbean.
We will be accepting donations through September and will host our annual packing party in the Simpson room between worship services on September 26. All are welcome to participate. Later in August, when we have inventoried the July contributions, we will provide a list of items most needed to fill our shoe boxes.
As a serendipitous addition to our Christmas in July OCC drive this year, we had a guest musician, Agoston Solczi, during our Traditional Worship Service. Gus is the music director at St. Paul’s Lutheran Church and was filling in for Erik. When he discovered that we were taking donations for Operation Christmas Child, he responded by saying that he had received a shoe box from OCC when he was a child living in Romania and spoke briefly about it during the service. He also shared a photo of him receiving the box.