NEW VISION COMMUNITY SERVICES

New Vision Church's 'Joy of Giving' helps up to 1,000 children with Christmas shopping

DECATUR - In 2008, New Vision Church was able to provide 125 children with $50 Christmas "shopping sprees" in its first "Joy of Giving" event. Last year, that number more than doubled to 300.

This year, however, the two previous marks have been utterly blown away, as New Vision is prepared to invite up to 1,000 children to participate in purchasing gifts for family and friends - for free.

The $50,000 Joy of Giving campaign is made possible by the donations of local and national businesses, some of whom also contributed by selling merchandise to the church at greatly reduced prices. Women's apparel retailer Coldwater Creek alone donated about $20,000 worth of clothing, according to Dow Moses, New Vision Church pastor.

"We wrote to over 100 different companies asking them to make contributions the first year," he said. "In return, we receive all sorts of goods; everything from Precious Moments figurines to sporting goods. At the beginning, it was really hard to get the donations, but now all the companies know it's a legitimate thing we're doing."

The format of the giveaway is similar to a "secret Santa" program, except the participating children, ages 5 to 12, have $50 in credit to the shop set up at the church. Rooms are created highlighting items of specific price brackets, such as $1, $5, $10 and $20. Most of these items have also been drastically reduced from former sticker prices, meaning the children are actually walking out with significantly more than $50 in goods.

"Wal-Mart is a good example, because they gave us 50 wall mirrors that retail for $99 each, but we have them for $20," Moses said. "A lot of kids are walking out with $150 or more in merchandise because sponsors were particularly generous."

One might wonder what a child would want with a mirror, but the point of the Joy of Giving is not for the kids to shop for themselves, but for their friends and families. Thus, the giveaway manages to teach a lesson about giving during the Christmas season as well as help families in need.

Due to the difficulty of handling up to 1,000 shopping kids, the event has been split up into two weekends. On Dec. 4, about 260 children from Enterprise Elementary School were given the opportunity to shop as part of New Vision Church's sponsorship of the school in Decatur's One Church, One School program. Every child in the school received one of the $50 gift certificates, and it was up to parents to decide whether to make use of it.

On Saturday, the Joy of Giving will be open again to children from all around Macon County. Moses is telling volunteers to expect busy crowds for at least five hours, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m.

For more information, call Dow Moses at 423-7333.