Our church is collecting school supplies for a wonderful organization in our community that loves children. I don’t mean they get warm fuzzies when they see cute pictures, or pat little heads and pinch chubby cheeks. I’m talking about loving children by serving in tangible ways. Like by providing school supplies. Shepherd Community serves kids who don’t usually get a brand new set of colored pencils or a cool new notebook each fall; they don’t even expect it. You should see their faces when they open up a backpack full of supplies. It’s sort of humbling, and always thrilling.

Not having new things isn’t really so bad, of course—I grew up on hand-me-downs and turned out alright—but not having basic necessities is a problem. With that in mind, I’m glad for the opportunity to share! And for some reason choosing jazzy school supplies, rather than plain Jane stuff, to bless the kid who has no expectations at all is more fun than taking pictures of my kids on the first day of school. (I wish I could post a picture of my oldest son when he was a senior in high school; but he’d be as mad as he was while I was forcing him to look at the camera. 🙂

This little notebook (with such an awesome message of hope for those of us who don’t feel very usable: God Recycles) is only $2.49. If you had, say, $15 to spare, which six kids would you bless with this fun yet essential little tool?

Or maybe you’d want to get a set (or two) of notebooks to remind your own kids of their freedom to declare their allegiance to God in school, which is illegal in many other countries. Far from being political, such a reminder is inspiring, and just might motivate your kids to embrace their freedom and to live in the joy of Christ. I can’t imagine anything more exciting that I could buy for $13.09!

I know you’re all going to post first-day-of-school pictures on facebook in the next few days or weeks. I hope you’ll also share a few words here about who you bought DaySpring school supplies for and how they responded.

Link up your review posts and tell us what you think about the Back to School products!