To the editor:

Thank you to all the individuals, groups and churches that participated in assembling shoebox gifts for children around the world as part of Operation Christmas Child. The High Peaks Church drop-off location sent 2,252 shoeboxes to Plattsburgh on Nov. 20, 2023, on their journey to children around the world. The northern Adirondack region collected 11,003 shoeboxes that are now on their way to Baltimore, Maryland, to be prepared to leave the country to go to children around the world and for the children to hear about Jesus and if they wish to accept him as their friend for life. The northern Adirondack region covers the counties of St. Lawrence, Essex, Franklin and Clinton.

Operation Christmas Child is a project of Samaritan’s Purse, and you can find more information about Operation Christmas Child at www.samaritanspurse.org/OCC. If you would still like to send a shoebox to a child, you can build a box online through this same website, click on the link to Build a Box Online. If you paid your donation to cover shipping and other costs to deliver your shoe box online, you can click on the Follow Your Shoebox link at the above website. Enter the email address you used when you made your payment or the bar code number on the label you used to mark your gender and age for your box. You need to just keep checking throughout the month of December until your boxes are processed and the information is uploaded to the look-up tool system.

In the last few years, shoeboxes from the Tri-Lakes area have gone to Haiti, Columbia, South Africa, Ukraine, Honduras and Malawi.

If you have any questions about Operation Christmas Child or are interested in participating in 2024, please leave a message for Sarah Kilby at High Peaks Church, at 518-891-3255 or highpeakschurch@gmail.com.

Sarah Kilby

Saranac Lake