For 4-year-old Walker Whiting, the joy of giving during the Christmas season began early this year, when he and his parents decided to turn their cookie-baking tradition into a means of raising money to donate at one of the Light the World Giving Machines announced Wednesday.
Since September, 4-year-old Walker and his parents have raised $500 to donate at one of these big red vending machines for giving.
And it was his story that, being highlighted at a news conference hosted Wednesday by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, embodied the goal of the church’s Light the World Giving Machine initiative: to bless both givers and receivers.
“Givers and receivers — what an opportunity that we each have to be givers and to bless the receivers,” said Elder W. Mark Bassett, a General Authority Seventy and executive director of the church’s missionary department, at the news conference.
“Jesus Christ offered a gift to every individual, every child of God, through his infinite sacrifice, and each one of us are recipients,” he said. “Both donors and recipients are blessed with this (Light the World Giving Machine) experience.”
How Giving Machine donations bless receivers
This year, for the eight straight year, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is providing a record number of Giving Machine locations.
From shoes and clothing to nutritious meals, crops, livestock and access to shelter, health care and education, “donations made through the Giving Machine initiative are transformative,” said Elder Matthew S. Holland, a General Authority Seventy and executive director of the church’s communication department, at the news conference.
Since the initiative began in 2017, Giving Machine donations have raised nearly $50 million, he explained.
Of this total, more than $16 million were raised in 2024 alone, providing 2 million meals to the hungry, vaccinating 500,000 children against polio and measles, and providing emergency food boxes to 125,000 refugees.
“With every visit to a giving machine,” Elder Holland said, “we hope people will learn about the realities that others face and see how their contribution, whatever it is, makes a difference in someone’s life.”
Young Women General President Emily Belle Freeman spoke following Elder Holland and highlighted how Giving Machine donations impact people’s lives and stories.
“It’s not just about the card, it’s about the story,” she said, speaking of the item cards people can select and watch drop when they make a donation at a Giving Machine.
“Every item purchased from these machines is delivered to a person in need, whether down the street or across the world,” she said. “And this year, more than 500 participating nonprofit organizations will make sure this happens.”
Examples and hope for change
Joining President Freeman at the front of the news conference, representatives from two of these organizations recounted the impact they’ve already seen from past years’ donations.
“These cards in the machine might just look like cards, but they’re giving back girls dignity and health and opportunity,” explained Tiffany Larson, CEO of Days for Girls International.
She recounted how a feminine hygiene kit donated through the Giving Machine initiative changed the life of a 15-year-old girl in Nepal, by providing her a “solution she can count on for years to come.”
Ana Peña of Mentors International, a nonprofit organization that helps lift families out of poverty through one-on-one mentoring and business training, shared how her team was able to coach a woman in Nicaragua on starting a business using a Giving Machine gift of chickens. This woman’s business has now grown to where she has 300 chickens, Peña said.
“She’s doubled her monthly income,” she continued, “and she’s able to pay for the kids’ school and regularly put food on the table.”
Representatives of other participating nonprofit organizations told the Deseret News how they anticipate this year’s donations will impact their work and the lives of those they serve. For some, this will be the first year their organizations participate in the initiative.
“We’re going to be in machines in five different states,” said Lauren Rymer, director of business development for Splash, a nonprofit bringing clean water and hygiene education to children in countries in South Asia and Africa.
These states include Florida, Texas, Nevada, Hawaii and Colorado. And Rymer said that being a small organization, the impact of Giving Machine donations on Splash will be “very big.”
“I feel like there’s going to be a real impact on our next project with Zambia,” she said, then explaining the donations will help the Splash team install water filtration systems, as well as hand washing and drinking stations, at all of the schools in three major cities in Zambia.
Valerie and Sam Lee of African Girls Hope Foundation shared that participating in the Giving Machine initiative for a third year will help them continue empowering refugee orphan girls in Africa to get in school and stay there until graduation, by providing them shoes, uniforms, school supplies, feminine hygiene products, mentors and more.
“Education is one of those great tools that breaks the cycle of poverty and brings them hope,” Valerie Lee said. “So it’s a gift of hope, and we’re so grateful to be able to help out with that.”
As for Benjamin Donner, executive director for the American Red Cross over central and southern Utah, he shared that the initiative’s donations of items such as comfort kits and blankets, emergency feeding kits, vital vaccines, infant care kits and family disaster aid will help further the Red Cross’s mission to “prevent and alleviate human suffering.”
There are moments that turn families and individuals’ lives upside down, Donner said, and because of programs like the Giving Machine initiative, “we are able to help them in those moments.”
“Not everybody in our community has the ability to roll up their sleeves and go deploy with me,” he said, “but what they can do is they can come here, they can still participate and make sure that work happens.”
All proceeds go directly to the initiative’s participating organizations, with the Church of Jesus Christ covering all operational costs, Elder Bassett explained in his news conference remarks.
“Jesus Christ is the light of the world,” he declared. “He has asked us, commanded us (and) pled with us to love one another. This is just one way that we can love our neighbors as we give.”
How Giving Machine donations bless givers
The donations to be collected in this year’s Giving Machine locations will bless thousands of recipients worldwide in the coming months.
But the act will also bless givers as they seek to follow the example of Jesus Christ, taught Elder Holland at the news conference.
“Like the wise men of old who made significant sacrifices to bring and offer gifts to the Savior, Jesus Christ, we are grateful for people all around the world … who sacrifice and offer donations to bring joy and light to others,” he said.
“When we focus our Christmas activities on him (Jesus Christ) and give gifts of love and service as he did, we fill the world with more light.”
And “as we share abundantly with others, we experience an abundance of light and joy in our hearts and homes. This is the true Christmas experience.”
At the news conference, leaders also announced the option of a new digital Giving Machine, which will be in select cities this year and allow users to donate using a digital interface.
This digital machine will work much like its mechanical counterpart, but at the end of each donation will show a short animated video demonstrating the process by which a donation moves from the machine to a recipient.
“It’s pretty incredible to see where this will go, and a lot of good people are in the process of this. We have so many wonderful participating nonprofits that are part of this work, and we are so grateful to work with them in this effort. … It’s only together that we can do this.”
