In 2003, the Go To Nations team decided to offer simple gifts of rice and school supplies to 30 of their neighbors at Christmas.  The reaction was overwhelming!  It was clear that this was a great opportunity to share God's love to the people of Burkina.  The next year the team gave out 300 toy-filled backpacks as gifts at a local elementary school, along with a simple Gospel skit.  “Give a Kid a Christmas” was born.  The number of gifts grew every year and the skits became more elaborate.  By 2008 we were giving 4000 children gifts of school supplies, toys and a Gospel tract.  We would spend a week each year training local volunteers and create new Gospel presentations. 

In 2010 Give a Kid Christmas started partnering with Operation Christmas Child and is now focused on training volunteers in Burkina on puppets, skits, songs and Gospel presentations during the OCC gift distributions.  Our volunteers are so passionate about sharing the Good News with children that they don’t want to stop when the gifts are all given out. This has become a year round ministry of our volunteers checking out equipment kits (speaker, microphone, puppets and puppet curtain all collapsible into a large backpack) and making Gospel presentations in the deepest parts of the Burkina Faso bush where the Gospel has never yet been proclaimed. 

In 2015 alone, there were 100+ local volunteers trained and sent out, 400 outreaches that reached over 80,000 children, and 10 new churches planted!  Praise God!  We covet your prayers and finances to continue to reach the least reached in Burkina Faso!

Josiah School of Ministry:

Today, the Go To Nations Burkina team in focused on 4 aspects of ministry: Identifying, Empowering, Equipping and Sending children’s ministers, in order to spark a children's ministry Movement in Francophone Africa.

We identify those who have a call to children's ministry by sharing the vision in churches.  We have a 1-year training program at the Ministry Center called "The Josiah School of Ministry" which provides practical and on-the-field training in child evangelism, discipleship, and church planting.    Also at the Ministry Center we have a group focused on developing Children's Ministry Tools - puppets, evangelism kits, curriculum, skits, etc. called CREE (Centre de Resources pour l'Evangelisation des Enfants).  All of this has the purpose of sending empowered child evangelists, missionaries and church leaders to reach the least reached children of West Africa.