(Photo credit: Alice Harold via Flickr)
USA (MNN) — It may be hard to believe, but there ARE United States citizens who don’t ask for Christmas presents because they don’t need anything. Rather than filling out materialistic “wish lists,” they simply ask loved ones to save their hard-earned dollars and cents.
Sponsorship may be the best way to show your affection for those types of people this Christmas season.
“Some of the [special needs] families…won’t have a Christmas if it isn’t for other families that have a heart to sponsor them,” says Sally Gallagher, co-founder of The King’s Table Ministries, explaining the Christmas sponsorship program.
“Right at this point, we have 25 families that are very, very needy. Sometimes, they don’t even have very much food.”
Sponsorship: more than a one-time gift
Macy’s at Christmas-time
(Photo, cropped, courtesy of Eric Mueller via Flickr)
According to the latest data from Gallup and the National Retail Federation, U.S. shoppers plan to spend around $800 on Christmas presents this year. In addition, consumer spending rose approximately 4% during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, compared to last year’s figures.
In a recent blog, social bookmarking giant Pinterest revealed ten of the most popular products added to Christmas wish lists in 2015.
Special needs individuals helped by The King’s Table Ministries have “wish lists,” too, Gallagher observes.
“My kids have wants,” she states. “Why wouldn’t you have wants as a special needs child?”
Those “wants” often go hand-in-hand with very real, and very immediate, family needs. Last year through their sponsorship program, The King’s Table Ministries helped a special needs family in Michigan that didn’t have a stove.
“They couldn’t cook, and they [also] had a table in their dining area that was broken,” Gallagher shares. After learning of these needs, a group of local believers took action.
“They collected a couple of other friends, and they went shopping, bought a stove; the husbands hooked it up for [the special needs family], and they bought a table for them.”
Most importantly, Christians provided this special needs family with the Gospel in word and deed. A majority of the families helped by The King’s Table Ministries are “unreached,” in the sense that they don’t know Christ as their Savior and they aren’t connected with a body of believers.
However, as special needs families see Christ’s love on display, they gradually open to learning more about Him.
(Photo credit: Kevin Dooley via Flickr)
“A lot of the families are just feeling alone,” Gallagher explains.
“When I would take them to our church…I’ve seen them just stand and cry in the hallway, because people go by and say ‘hi’ to their children and ‘hi’ to them. Because they’ve been shunned [at churches] before, they don’t think that anyone’s going to accept them.”
You can make a forever difference for a special needs family through the Christmas sponsorship program offered by King’s Table. Please contact Laura Henkel [email protected] for more information.
Or, you can connect with King’s Table Ministries by phone: 616.648.8029
Hello, is it too late to get help? Unfortunately my husband lost his job. We want be able to provide a Christmas for our family. It’s 5 of us: my husband, myself, 6-year-old son and grandson, 2 years old. My son and grandson have special needs. They are in special education in school. Now that they understand I can’t provide one. I wasn’t sure if you would help because I live in Detroit. Lords will, I’m not to late. Thank you.