Over 8T kids get gift bags from Maranatha

CEBU, Philippines - Christmas evokes the goodness in us.

Some 8,500 beneficiaries - mostly children while a few of them parents and elderly from depressed areas here in the city - lined up as early as 4 a.m. yesterday to receive gift bags containing packs of noodles, bags of rice, and cans of sardines.

The Simbahang Pambata Ministry of the Maranatha Christian Fellowship sponsored the annual Christmas party inside its headquarters at the Maranatha World Outreach Center in corner P. Burgos and V. Gullas (formerly Manalili) Streets. The three-hour program included snacks, games, and speeches.

This is the eleventh year that Ministry head Jesse Saberon and his colleagues have organized the party, which he said is important to show that “whatever we have, we share”.

Saberon said that the budget allocation of 300 sacks of rice, 150 boxes of sardines, and 210 boxes of noodles came from “benevolent people” like businessmen, students, ministry members, and “those who want to remain anonymous”.

He said that it is the ministry’s vision to make every Christian happy in little ways they could.

Ruby Salutan, administrator of the said ministry, said that the gift-giving started with “purely” children, but eventually they noticed that some parents and adults came so that they began accommodating them.

“God did not qualify whom to help… mao nga kung puwede tanan matabangan, among tabangan,” she said. 

Salutan added that other than the annual gift-giving, MCF is into weekly feeding program, free clinic, and scholarship program. Part of the goal of MCF is the Operation Kausaban Project which focuses on holistic community development, particularly in sitio San Roque, Cebu City. — Marjun A. Baguio, UC intern/MEEV   (FREEMAN NEWS)