Mid-Missouri child has packed thousands of Christmas gifts
STORY AND PHOTOS by Paul Newton
By the time most children start making a Christmas list, Abigail Porter has already spent months thinking about what someone else needs. Inside a 40-by-40-foot pole barn in rural Russellville, rows of shoeboxes are filled by the 11-year-old and her helpers. There are school supplies, toys, cups, bowls, silverware and stuffed animals all waiting to bring smiles to children across the globe.
Abigail has packed shoebox gifts for Operation Christmas Child since 2019. It’s turned into a year-round mission that’s filled her family’s basement, inspired a new building and drawn help from relatives, church members, friends and others. When Abigail delivered 624 shoeboxes to the First Baptist Church in California, Missouri, in 2025, it brought her total to 2,586 gifts to be sent overseas.
“I saw an article for it, and I really wanted to do it,” Abigail says. “I saw all the happy faces on the kids who had got a shoebox.”
A Mission Begins
Operation Christmas Child is a project of Samaritan’s Purse — a Christian humanitarian organization — that sends shoebox gifts filled with toys, school supplies and hygiene items to children in more than 170 countries and territories around the world. Abigail’s family first packed the gifts in their basement. Her late grandmother, Aileen, helped get her started. That first year, Abigail packed 76 boxes, which at the time seemed like a massive undertaking.
The number has grown annually since. Her goal was to deliver 1,000 this November. She surpassed that number in June. Abigail and her parents, Co-Mo Connect members Micah and Laurie, shop sales, look for deals and ask for shoebox supplies for birthdays and Christmas. “Those kids that get the boxes don’t have much for themselves,” Abigail says. “I don’t need everything I want.”
Room to Grow
The basement couldn’t work forever. As more donations came in and more boxes were packed, space became tight.
Abigail wanted a building. Her parents told her to pray about it. Eventually, with help from the community, the family built the 1,600-square-foot building next to their home. It gives Abigail room for shelves, tables, boxes and packing parties. “There are people in the community who stepped up and did a lot of pro bono time and effort to make it happen,” Micah says.
Boxes are made with the child’s age and gender in mind. Each includes useful items, but also something fun — what Samaritan’s Purse area coordinator Michelle Hale calls a “wow item.” For Abigail, one favorite is a stuffed animal, specifically a flamingo. “Some of these kids live in situations that are hard to imagine,” says Michelle, a Three Rivers Electric Cooperative member. “So just something clean and special like a Barbie doll or soccer ball can just be a tangible way of showing God’s love to them.”
Abigail leaves a note in each box with her email address. The boxes are collected in November and shipped out.
The Box Arrives
Abigail has received messages from children who got her boxes. One came from a 5-year-old girl in Nigeria who received school materials and toys. Another note came from a girl who received a doll. “I named the doll Abigail,” the girl wrote. “It’s my first doll ever.”
Those messages make the work feel close, even when the boxes travel far away. “When we get an email, it’s a big deal,” Laurie says.
For the Porters, packing the boxes is about more than the items inside. Each box is prayed over and is meant to show a child they’re loved. Micah says the mission has helped Abigail grow in confidence. She’s spoken about her shoeboxes at churches, Vacation Bible School, school and in interviews. “You don’t see a child that’s that selfless,” he says. “As a parent, you want to nourish that.”
Laurie hopes her daughter remembers that a dream can grow when people are willing to work for it. “She says that one day she’s going to another country and meet some of the kids she’s sent a shoebox.”
To support Abigail’s mission of packing shoeboxes, you can purchase items from her Amazon wish list at bit.ly/abigailshoebox.
Email Paul Newton at pnewton@ruralmissouri.coop.