• Reason for the Season
Focus on the Reason for Season
We are all too aware of how commercial Christmas has become and how every year, it creeps earlier on the calendar, even before Halloween and Thanksgiving are barely in view. It is way too easy for us to loose our way with this season. If it is easy for adults, just think how confusing it can be for our children.
So I want to remind you, to do all you can to reframe the reason for the season. Christmas is really about Jesus…period. So how can we do this? Here are just a few suggestions to make Jesus the main thing. Are you willing to make a better effort to curb this trend?
- Discuss what Christmas is not… gifts for us, spending money, shopping, wrapping, lights, trees, decorating, etc.
- Teach the Christmas Symbols: Advent candles, explain symbols: star, tree, mistletoe, gift giving, birthday party, cross, angels, shepherds, kings, shepherds crook, BC/AD, Christmas traditions.
- Concentrate on the Christmas story of the birth of Jesus. Actually, go to the source, read it from the Bible for them, so it is not talk or just a story.
- Show DVD Clips from the Jesus Film for Children (Luke), or the excellent Visual Bible (Matthew)
- Create Programming for the Preschool, to begin to “reset” the focus on the next generation. Angel Breakfast is a great option. (Search Kidology.org)
- Use the Gift Object Lesson to redirect the myth of giving. See http://www.kidhelper.com/?p=1082
- Visit the Christmas Zone on www.Kidology.org for great collections of ideas on rethinking your emphasis on teaching the real meaning of Christmas.
- Challenge the kids to make this the most meaningful Christmas ever. Do things for the homeless, hungry and hospitalized, and and or hostages in prison.
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