By Gerri Miller
Elmore/Autauga News Staff Writer
When my daughter Marissa and my son Justin were children, we packed many a shoebox for different Elmore County organizations to ship overseas on behalf of Samaritan Purse’s Operation Christmas Child. We knew that the boxes would travel to other countries to help children, but never dreamed that the small boxes could lead someone to accept Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior.
That’s exactly what happened to Yves Dushime – a gift from a stranger and a tiny piece of paper would shape his life from that day forward. I met the 27-year-old missionary last week at Ridgecrest Baptist Church in Montgomery as he shared his life story to a group of pastors.
Yves was born in a refugee camp in Congo into a family of eight. The ripple effects of the 1994 Rwandan genocide sent his family as refugees on a lifelong journey of searching for hope and a safe haven.
During the genocide, members of the Hutu ethnic majority in the east-central African nation of Rwanda murdered as many as 800,000 people, mostly of the Tutsi minority. Started by Hutu nationalists in the capital of Kigali, the genocide spread throughout the country with shocking speed and brutality, as ordinary citizens were incited by local officials and the Hutu Power government to take up arms against their neighbors.
Yves’ neighbors took the calling to heart and murdered his grandparents in a brutal machete attack. It was a while before Yves’ parents revealed to him what really happened.
“It took me a while to process that information,” Yves said. “I was forced to grow up fast – I couldn’t understand how this happened. I read many books and journals in my quest for answers.”
Yves said the murder of his grandparents and so many others left him with a radical hatred for humanity. “Close to a million people lost their lives and nobody did anything,” he said. “That hatred consumed every bit of who I was.”
By the time the Tutsi-led Rwandese Patriotic Front gained control of the country through a military offensive in early July, hundreds of thousands of Rwandans were dead and two million refugees (mainly Hutus) fled Rwanda, exacerbating what had already become a full-blown humanitarian crisis.
“Twenty percent of Rwanda’s population was killed for the crime of being born into the wrong ethnic group,” he said.
Yves was the son of a pastor and had read the Bible front to back four times by his 11th birthday. But he experienced and witnessed things that were more brutal and more evil than any child should have to endure.
Armies of Children
Such atrocities made it easy for the terrorists to create armies of children who sought revenge on those who killed their loved ones. Yves said those who created child armies tapped into the childrens’ need for revenge.
“We were always taught to love our neighbors,” Yves said. “But the anger and hatred in my heart made this seem impossible for me. I could have easily been one of the children recruited to fight.”
But then something miraculous happened that turned Yves’ life around when he was 11 years old. He was given the first present he had ever received but even more importantly, he was given hope. He was given an Operation Christmas Child shoebox and inside he found a sticky note that said “God Loves You, Jesus Loves You, I Love You.”
On the day he received his shoebox, he realized that God’s family extends beyond borders, and he said he felt deeply cared for and loved. “It was the first time someone from the humanity I hated told me that they love me,” he said.
“How could stuff from the Dollar Tree have such an impact?” he asked. “I am here today because someone like you stepped out in faith. I am here because of a shoebox sent to me 16 years ago.”
These were items that Americans would take for granted – toothbrushes, toothpaste, combs and soap, etc. “To me this was luxury,” Yves said. “To think that someone spent all that money to give me a gift was the single seed that God had planted to replace all of my pain and brokenness.”
He said all of his work with Operation Christmas Child started with a message of love on a sticky note. He said it gave him a new life from his broken humanity. “If they (the sender of the box) can demonstrate such a love for me, how much greater do you think God’s love is?” he said.
“God used a total stranger and a tiny piece of paper to reach into the darkest corners of my heart,” he said.
The Witch Doctor
Yves said the reason the shoeboxes are so effective in bringing people to God is that they can be taken into places where no Christian can go. The tiny village where Yves grew up was greatly influenced by voodoo and one of the dark corners where being a Christian could get you killed.
Being a Christian minister made Yves’ father a target for witch doctors in his village. Instead of standing down when they threatened to kill him and his family, his father would simply invite them to eat dinner with the family.
“He gave those who threatened to kill us our home address – who does that? Yves said. “My dad knows his purpose.”
The family wasn’t so sure when one night through the window they saw one of the local witch doctors headed toward their house with a group of people behind him. Terrified, they hid in the house. After fifteen minutes of hiding, Yves’ father decided to open the door. Yves said that what the witch doctor said to his father will stay in his heart for the rest of his life.
“The witch doctor said, ‘I have come here today because I realize that your God is so much stronger than mine and I want to give my life to Christ.’”
Yves said the “army” the witch doctor brought with him was his family. His father said the Lord’s Prayer and the entire family gave their life to Christ.
“His story (the witch doctor) started with 300 boxes that were shared earlier,” Yves said. “The witch doctor began struggling with a power he didn’t understand.” The witch doctor brought his witchcraft tools in a bag and ask his father to burn them in a fire.
The Dushime family was criticized after the witch doctor gave his life to Christ because they joined him in fellowship-often in public places. Other pastors started telling his dad not to do this. “They said we shouldn’t hang out with a witch doctor – what will others think of us?”
When the former witch doctor asked to be baptized, the Dushimes traveled two hours to a river and what happened next surprised them. Instead of the small crowd they expected, hundreds of people lined up to get baptized.
“God used a witch doctor to bring his message of hope to my people,” Yves said.
Yves’ family was blessed. Only one to two percent of refugee families ever get resettled. “Our being here is such a huge miracle,” he said. He said he was at an event one day and saw a display for Operation Christmas Child and said “That is me-where do I sign up?”
“I hadn’t seen one of the shoeboxes in ten years,” he said. He volunteered and is now a staff member who has traveled across the country talking to groups for the last seven years.
After sharing the story of the Good Samaritan, Jesus said “Go and do likewise.” That is the mission of Samaritan’s Purse—to follow the example of Christ by helping those in need and proclaiming the hope of the Gospel.
Yves encouraged the pastors to go the extra mile to send out more shoe boxes. “What is standing in the way of you taking the extra step to bring your message of hope?” he asked.
The South-Central Alabama Area Team (Autauga, Elmore, Lowndes and Montgomery counties) packed 20,216 shoebox gifts in 2020. On average, a shoebox distribution center consists of roughly 200 children – so about 101 churches were directly impacted by donor churches in this area.
“The reality is The South-Central Alabama area team has the potential to pack far more than 20,216 shoebox gifts,” said Tracy Bullinger of Samaritan’s Purse. “Our local, boots on the ground, volunteer teams serve year-round to promote and support shoebox packing in their areas. We need to grow our influence by growing the local area team.”
Operation Christmas Child is a project of Samaritan’s Purse, an international relief organization. The organization’s mission is to provide local partners around the world with shoeboxes filled with small toys, hygiene items, and school supplies as a means of reaching out to children in their own communities with the Good News of Jesus Christ. We ship these simple gifts outside the United States to children affected by war, poverty, natural disaster, famine, and disease; and to children living on Native American reservations in the U.S.
Yves still carries a blue and grey scarf that was packed in his box 16 years ago that reminds him of the time he gave his life to Christ.
If you are interested in becoming a Project Leader—leading a church or group effort in packing shoebox gifts—the organization has designed a resource page full of ideas and materials that will help you, your family, church, business, or community center get involved in Operation Christmas Child. The web address is Project Leader Resources (samaritanspurse.org)
You can even join an online community of Project Leaders to share your questions, tips, ideas, and encouragement with thousands of others leading their own shoebox-packing groups across the nation.
“Every shoebox is an opportunity to reach a child with the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It’s about telling children around the world and their families that God loves them. He hasn’t forgotten them. We’re taking the Good News to the ends of the earth,” said Franklin Graham, president and CEO Samaritan’s Purse. Franklin Graham is the son of evangelist Billy Graham.
To request more information, click on Year-Round OCC Volunteer Form (samaritanspurse.org). To volunteer, follow this link: Public – MyOCC (samaritanspurse.org).
