Keeping Christ in Christmas

Here is the last of what I shared in my Advent Study......A list of how to keep Christ in Christmas with your family......



1) Give God one very special gift just from you to him: Let this gift be something personal that no one else needs to know about, and let it be a sacrifice. David said in 2 Samuel 24 that he would not offer a sacrifice to God that cost him nothing. Maybe your gift to God will be to forgive someone you've needed to forgive for a long time. You may discover that you've given a gift back to yourself.


Corrie Ten Boom, a Christian who survived extreme brutality in a German concentration camp after rescuing many Jews from certain death during the Nazi Holocaust, was later able to say, "Forgiveness is to set a prisoner free, and to realize the prisoner was you."


Perhaps your gift will be to commit to spending time with God daily. Or maybe there is something God has asked you to give up, like last New Year's resolution. Make this your most important gift of the season.

2) Plan a Project of Good Will for you and your kids to do – soup kitchen –sponsor a child, angel tree, a family etc…..

3) Give gifts ‘in honor of’ instead of something unneeded
Places to Give To –
Toys For Tots
Operation Christmas Child
Make A Wish Foundation
Compassion International
Habitat For Humanity
Heifer International
Hands of Hope

4) Have more ‘religious’ decor than santa decor and explain the symbolism to your children.

5)Attend church on Christmas Eve – AND ON CHRISTMAS DAY if it comes on Sunday.

6) Send Christmas Cards with a spiritual message.

7) Allow your children to ask for 3 gifts from Santa.....that is how many Jesus got from the Wisemen


8) Do an Advent calendar

9) Have a Jesse Tree.
The Jesse Tree is named from Isaiah 11:1: "A shoot will spring forth from the stump of Jesse, and a branch out of his roots." It is a vehicle to tell the Story of God in the Old Testament, and to connect the Advent Season with the faithfulness of God across 4,000 years of history. The Branch is a biblical sign of newness out of discouragement, which became a way to talk about the expected messiah (e.g., Jer 23:5). It is therefore an appropriate symbol of Jesus the Christ, who is the revelation of the grace and faithfulness of God. The Jesse Tree helps us retell this story, and express this hope.

10) Add Baby Jesus to nativity on Christmas day. You can do this in different ways. At our house, we have an advent calendar where you can put small gifts for your children. You can let Baby Jesus be the gift on Christmas Day. Or if you don't have an advent calendar like that, just wrap the Baby Jesus and put him under your tree. That way you can explain God's gift to us as they open the gift of Baby Jesus and place him in the manger.

11) Have a birthday party for Jesus. We will have a birthday cake for Jesus with our lunch. I also read where someone had the birthday cake for breakfast. What fun!

12)Read the Account of the nativity.

13) Read Christian Books about Christmas. Here is a list I came up with - with a little help from my friend, Deidre.

The Candy Makers Gift retold by David Haidel (The Legend of the Candy Cane)

An Angels Story by Max Lucado

The Christmas Child by Max Lucado

The Gift of Christmas by Myra Scovel

Jotham’s Journey by Arnold Ytreeide

The Jesse Tree by Geraldine McCaughrean

The Story of the Nativity by Elizabeth Winthrop

Mary’s First Christmas by Walker Wangerin

The Crippled Lamb by Max Lucado

Jacob’s Gift by Max Lucado

The Legend of the Three Trees Retold by Angela Elwell Hunt

Mary’s Treasure Box by Carolyn Kramlich


These are the things my study group discussed..... My friend, Kris, told us that her mother in law, gives a gift to her children each Sunday of Advent and it is always a part of a nativity. Her girls are in Elementary School and she writes them a letter with their gifts. In the letter she talks to them about that piece of the nativity and asks them questions to get them thinking....I LOVE THIS!!!!

Do you all have anything to add? Have a great Wednesday.

Tonight is our Christmas program at church......and my camera broke this week. I am so sad now that I didn't win McMama's giveaway.....I really need it now. This is a very bad time of the year to be without a camera....especially for someone as picture crazy as me.