CCC Students to Deliver 5,040 ‘Holiday Care Boxes’ During Christmas Conferences
College students who attend Christian conferences often receive plenty of motivation and vision for spreading the Gospel for Christ but not an immediate opportunity to put to action what they learned. But most of the 12,000 students who will attend Campus Crusade for Christ’s Christmas conferences this year will not only be learning about the theory of how to grow in their faith but also how to practice their faith through an outreach event scheduled into the conference.
Seven of the ten CCC’s Christmas conferences this winter, between Dec. 29-Jan. 5, are planning an outreach event where college students will be able to deliver food-filled “Holiday Care Boxes” to needy families in Spokane, WA.; Greensboro, N.C.; Denver, CO.; Dallas, TX.; Minneapolis, Tenn.; Indianapolis, IN., and Washington, D.C.
“Students are putting their faith into action by helping meet the physical needs of the less fortunate by delivering the HolidayCare Boxes,” said Ryan McReynolds, director of the Denver Christmas Conference.
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“Each box has a retail value of about $25 and contains at least 20 food staples like canned meat products, pasta, rice, beans, vegetables, fruits and cooking oil to help a family replenish their pantry. We often think about helping the needy during the holidays. We wanted to give something that could help them after the holidays are over,” McReynolds explained.
Passing out “Holiday Care Boxes” has been a tradition at CCC’s Christmas conferences for around ten years, Tony Arnold of the U.S. Campus Crusade for Christ told the Christian Post. The campaign is possible through collaboration between Here’s Life Inner City, the national urban ministry of Campus Crusade based in New York City and Los Angeles-based Children’s Hunger Fund which assembled the boxes.
The cover of each box contains a verse from Psalms 145: “The LORD is faithful to all his promises and loving toward all he has made. The LORD upholds all those who fall and lifts up all who are bowed down. The eyes of all look to you, and you give them their food at the proper time. You open your hand and satisfy the desires of every living thing.
The first outreach will take place at the Greensboro conference on Dec. 29. Students will divide up into teams and work alongside volunteers from local Christian organizations and churches to use cars and home-deliver the packages to needy communities.
In addition to meeting families’ physical needs, students will also be addressing their spiritual hunger by handing out a Bible accompanying each box, which already contain a bilingual copy of CCC’s Four Spiritual Laws in English and Spanish.
“Students also want to help meet spiritual needs as they leave a Bible with each family and share with anyone interested about the comfort and purpose they’ve found in a relationship with God through Jesus Christ. We say they’re sharing a gift of food and faith,” said McReynolds.
“Spiritual needs are more intangible but no less real,” Arnold told the Christian Post. “By leaving a copy of the Bible with the people they encounter as well as sharing their faith of how to have a personal relationship with Jesus, students are wanting to meet the deep spiritual hunger to know God personally.
“The Christmas season offers an opportunity for believers to share with their friends from other faiths or no faiths what the true meaning of Christmas really is -- As often said -- what the reason for the season is all about. In the midst of all hype and the shopping excursions and family gatherings, there are opportunities to connect with the spiritual interests that people have that maybe hidden during the rest of the year.”
A total of 5040 Holiday Care boxes will be distributed, worth a total of $126,000, according to Campus Crusade for Christ.
Brooke Gresham, a University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill student who will attend the Greensboro conference for the fourth time this year, said giving out the Holiday Care Boxes is by far her favorite aspect of Christmas Conference.
“Serving in Greensboro helps me to see the needs of my hometown and the ways I can make a difference by simply offering a helping hand to friends and neighbors,” she said.
Orlando-based Campus Crusade for Christ, founded by the late Bill Bright, started as a campus student ministry on University of California, Los Angeled in 1951. The ministry has grown to more than 1000 colleges in the USA and in more than 190 countries around the world. The Christmas conferences have been offered annually for over 40 years.
“The holidays offer more than just a chance for students to get some home-cooking,” said Mark Gauthier, National Director of Campus Crusade.
“Each conference has many components,” continued Gauthier. “They are part training and vision, part missions and part family reunion and party. The conferences help students take the next step in their faith and challenges them to join in a cause greater than themselves.”
For more information on the CCC’s Christmas conferences, visit www.campuscrusadeforchrist.com.
