Copperas Cove church hosts yard sale to support Operation Christmas Child

Robertson Avenue Baptist Church turned its yard sale into a shoebox drive for children overseas, using the Saturday fundraiser at 305 E. Robertson Ave. in Copperas Cove to support Operation Christmas Child.

The church has helped with the Samaritan’s Purse project for about 15 years, and local volunteer BJ Logue has become one of the faces of the effort in Coryell County. Logue, the church’s project lead and an area drop-off leader, said of a recent campaign, “We had a really, really good year,” after Robertson Avenue Baptist Church far topped its target.

That campaign showed how quickly a local church can turn steady volunteer work into a large-scale result. The congregation set a goal of 450 shoeboxes, then collected 600. It also received 85 additional filled boxes from outside the church, bringing the Robertson Avenue total to 685. Counting other drop-off boxes from the area, volunteers sent 1,921 shoeboxes to the Dallas distribution center.

For the church, the yard sale is not just a fundraiser but a practical way to keep that pipeline moving. Operation Christmas Child collects gift-filled shoeboxes for children in need around the world, and Samaritan’s Purse says the project has delivered more than 244 million shoebox gifts since 1993. The organization also uses a national collection week each November, when local drop-off sites open and churches help move the boxes into the wider distribution network.

Logue has said some gifts are especially popular with children, including small instruments, noise makers and stuffed animals. Those shoeboxes can also lead into The Greatest Journey, a 12-lesson discipleship course offered to children after they receive a box. For Robertson Avenue Baptist Church, that long chain starts with familiar faces in Copperas Cove sorting donations, running sales and packing gifts for children they may never meet. The result is a local tradition that keeps drawing volunteers because it produces something concrete: boxes, supplies and a visible path from a church parking lot in Coryell County to a child across the world.