News

Christmas Child recipient to share her story

Dania Yadago will speak at Hendersonville Presbyterian Church on Wednesday, July 25.

By Lightning Reports, Published: July 20, 2018

Operation Christmas Child, a project of international Christian relief organization Samaritan’s Purse, delivers gift-filled shoeboxes to millions of children in need each year. For many years, families in Henderson County have packed shoebox gifts for boys and girls around the world.

One of the gifts reached Dania Yadago in a Middle Eastern country when she was a young girl. Yadago is now visiting Hendersonville residents to share how the simple gift had a life-changing impact.
 
Yadago, hosted by the local project of Operation Christmas Child, will be telling her story at the weekly Table Talk of Hendersonville Presbyterian Church, 699 N. Grove Street, at 6:25 p.m. Wednesday, July 25.  
She wants to encourage residents as they kick off the upcoming collection season to fill more than 24,000 shoeboxes with fun toys, school supplies and hygiene items—contributing to the global goal of reaching 11 million children in Jesus’ Name.
 
Dania Yadago and her family lived in three Middle Eastern countries before they finally made their way to the United States through the United Nations Commission for Human Rights. Dania and her family lived in severe poverty, surviving days when they had nothing to eat.
 
Because there wasn’t much that Dania’s parents could afford, if they wanted something, the only thing they could do was to pray for it. This particular year Dania’s family had a very specific prayer. They prayed every day for a radio. When they received their shoebox, Dania and her brother were thrilled with excitement to go through the special gifts that this box held. They were ecstatic that someone who they probably won’t ever meet on this side of the world, thought of them, prayed for them and sent them a tangible act of love. What excited them the most was that everything in their shoebox was new.
Dania treasured every item in the Christmas box – colored pencils, crayons, coloring books, hard candy, puzzle books and soap. She especially loved the smell of soap. Every night Dania would open her shoebox, take out and count the items and put them back. She was so afraid to lose them or have them stolen. Sometimes she was afraid of using her items because she didn’t want to run out of them. But that wasn’t all there was to the shoebox. As Dania and her family carefully went through each item in their gift, they shrieked in disbelief as they pulled out a fully functional radio — a specific answer to a specific prayer. That day Dania learned that with God, all things are possible. She learned that there is power in prayer.
Dania graduated from Salem College with a degree in education and a minor in music. She loves Operation Christmas Child, packs shoeboxes and shares her love for the Lord and for this ministry whenever she has an opportunity. 

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Yadago will speak at the weekly Table Talk of Hendersonville Presbyterian Church, 699 N. Grove Street, at 6:25 p.m. Wednesday, July 25. There is an optional church supper at 5:30. For supper reservations call 828-699-2070.