USA (MNN) — As you consider giving gifts this Christmas, have you thought about a gift for someone you don't know — a gift that could make an eternal difference?
Kids Alive International is looking for people to help them purchase gifts for the children and families they serve this Christmas. Kids Alive's Al Lackey says, "Kids Alive cares for about 6,500 orphaned and abandoned children — children that are living in extreme poverty. And one of our desires is to bless these children at the Christmas season with gifts."
Lackey says their gifts are a little bit different, however. "[We want to buy] tools and seeds for a family garden which would provide food for a family for a year, or buy a goat, or a chicken, or a Bible, or school books or a backpack."
Lackey says it may be hard to choose something. "We have a gift catalog in which people can share their love at this Christmas season with orphans and abandoned children, and really do something that will have an impact on a child; they'll know that somebody in the U.S. would love a child enough to send a gift way across the ocean."
While many of the kids with Kids Alive have a place to live and someone to care for them, there are still other children who don't. You could help those children with a secret gift. "One of our goals is to take in 600 new children. Although this child won't know this is a special gift, for $60 we can actually locate the child and bring him into one of our ministry sights, offering him hope for the future. That is a real Christmas gift."
While gifts may seem material, Lackey says these are tools to help share the Gospel. "All the children will hear the Gospel. We work with local churches. We integrate them into churches, if they are non-believers. The kids in our homes have devotions."
Kids Alive works in 17 different countries in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
If you'd like to help Kids Alive deliver Christmas gifts to children in need, click here.
