Ginger Spickler, who lives in Midtown with her husband, Josh, and their two boys (Walt, 4, and Patrick, 3 months), participates in "Advent Conspiracy" with her church and family. The tenets are "Worship Fully, Spend Less, Give More, Love All" and are about restoring the focus of Christmas on Christ.
The Spicklers are raising money for global clean-water initiatives. "Americans spend about $450 billion every year on Christmas and it's estimated that it would take only about $10 billion per year to solve the global water crisis," Ginger Spickler said. The Spicklers "spend less" on things like Christmas cards, opting to e-mail a slide show to family and friends. The money they save is sent to Living Water International, which covers the "love all."
She said they "give more" by focusing on relational gifts. "Last year, we gave Josh's sister and her husband, who live in Nashville, a weekend in Memphis -- we took them to a Grizzlies game, out to dinner, and just basically spent time with them," she said. She has asked several groups in which she traditionally exchanged presents, like coworkers, if they'd prefer to take the money and donate it to a good cause instead.
As a family, the Spicklers spend a lot of time talking about why they really celebrate Christmas, which is where the "worship fully" part comes in. "Walt understands that the Advent calendar isn't counting down the days until he gets presents, but rather the days until we celebrate Jesus' birthday," Spickler said. "He's still looking forward to the presents, but he knows that's not all there is to it."
If it's December, then there must be frost in the air, gingerbread in the oven, and ... right on time, Bill O'Reilly and the other defenders of Christmas bemoaning the prevalence of "Happy Holidays" - rather than "Merry Christmas" - greetings.
There's a war on Christmas, O'Reilly recently reminded viewers, driven by those who "loathe the baby Jesus." This season, a holiday-dÉcor company is marketing the CHRIST-mas Tree, a bushy artificial tree with a giant cross where the trunk should be. And the Colorado-basedFocus on the Family is continuing its Stand for Christmas campaign to highlight the offenses of Christmas-denying retailers. The campaign was launched, according to its website, because "citizens across the nation were growing dissatisfied with the tendency of corporations to omit references to Christmas from holiday promotions."
But to a growing group of Christians, this focus on the commercial aspect of Christmas is itself the greatest threat to one of Christianity's holiest days. "It's the shopping, the going into debt, the worrying that if I don't spend enough money, someone will think I don't love them," says Portland pastor Rick McKinley. "Christians get all bent out of shape over the fact that someone didn't say 'Merry Christmas' when I walked into the store. But why are we expecting the store to tell our story? That's just ridiculous."
Read the rest of the article here.
The following article was in Saturday's Commercial Appeal. Unfortunately, it's not online, so I decided to post it here.
Neighborhood Church believes that Christmas can [still] change the world and has partnered with the Advent Conspiracy (www.AdventConspiracy.org) to celebrate Christmas by spending less, giving more, worshiping fully and loving all this season.
Neighborhood Church (NC) has partnered with Advent Conspiracy (AC) to help Memphis experience what Christmas is really about (celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ and peace and love for each other), and away from what it has become (consumerism).
NC Pastor Robert Grisham says “We’re encouraging one another to get creative and give meaningful, relational gifts this year. Then, the money we save we’re going to give away to those who really need it.
NC is holding events like the “Think Globally, Party Locally” party, where, instead of toasting to our own good health, we’re asking all of our friends to toast to the world’s good health at a rockin’ good party to raise money for global clean water initiatives through Living Water International.
The Advent Conspiracy is a grassroots movement with more than 1,000 churches in 17 countries participating as co-conspirators- with projects as varied as drilling a water well for those who lack access to clean water or simply encouraging congregations to think of meaningful acts of kindness as meaningful gift options to replace traditional gifts.
Last year, through Advent Conspiracy, $3 Million was raised for relief projects which included providing clean water and medical attention in communities around the world.
This year, Advent Conspiracy anticipates that individuals and churches will match last year’s commitment to charitable gifts and will make a lasting impact in communities around the world.
For more information about Advent Conspiracy, please visit: www.adventconspiracy.org.
For more information about Neighborhood Church, please visit www.ncmidtown.com.
Here's the description from the Neiman Marcus catalog:
Put on your matching hat, slip under the muffin top of your Cupcake Car, and let the world figure itself out for awhile. Get (or give) the sheer, joyful chaos of a gift that is mind-blowing, triple-dog-dare, double-infinity forever cool. Make the kids or grandkids literally squeal with joy. Bring it to work and buzz the breakroom. Crash parades! Putter about the 'hood. Ever had a crowd of kids chasing after you just for the crazy gleeful heck of it? (No worries, the top speed is a comfy-safe 7 mph.) What's it made of? A 24-volt electric motor, a heavy-duty battery, sheet metal, wire, fabric, wood…and mad genius.
Be sure to get yours while they last. Only $25,000!
Jonathan Merritt writes about the shift in political thinking for young evangelicals
Excellent talk from Chris Seay at Q 2007 on consumerism. Check out some of the other talks while you're there.
One of my favorite all-time quotes, and one I need to be reminded of from time to time
Joe Boyd on what it means to be a pilgrim
Seth Godin's Tribes Q&A ebook is available for free download. I haven't read the book yet, but this makes me want to.
The Resurgence has the audio and video from their Shepherding a Child's Heart Conference available for download.
Final resource, I promise…Alan Hirsch and Michael Frost's new book, ReJesus, is out. You can download the intro and chapter 1 here.
It is sometimes said that this celebration, and its mythology is not based in the Bible or anything historical or particularly Christian. Some go even further in arguing that Christmas is just an adaptation of the pagan Saturnalia, the reversal festival of the Romans which climaxed on and just after the winter solstice on Dec. 21. This latter claim is false, since Christmas has always been celebrated after the Saturnalia was already over, and in the case of the Orthodox church, long after the Saturnalia was over. But my concern in this post is with the man himself-- jolly ole St. Nick.
Whether you call him St. Nick (short for Nickolas) or Santa Claus ( a barbarization and abbreviation of Saint Nik Claus) we are indeed talking about a real Christian person, Nicholas of Myra.
For scores of Bankrate readers, it's the season to save money. We asked you to submit holiday money tips, and you sent a stocking full of great ideas for giving on a tight budget.
Following are some of our frugal favorites among your suggestions. We like these ideas because they show that simple, economical gifts can have an impact that lasts far beyond the holiday season.
College savings accountsYear of free meals
My 94-year-old mother-in-law doesn't need more "things." So, for Christmas last year, we made up a coupon booklet with one coupon per month (decorated with appropriate clip art) to be redeemed for dinner with us at a local restaurant. She is thrilled that we have committed to take her out for dinner once a month, in addition to the regular holiday meals we share during the year.
-- S. Lea Lowe
Health care for the homeless
Last year at the office, I sent an e-mail to my colleagues that in lieu of getting them gifts, I would make a pledge to a local charity in their honor. My company is in health care, so I pledged money to a local agency to provide medical care to a homeless person living here in the nation's capital. This gesture seemed very much appreciated when I did it last year -- so I plan to do it again.
-- Carol Sardinha
Picture bookmarks
This is a great one for grandparents -- I take pictures of my children and make bookmarks out of them. On my computer, I put several small pictures into a strip and print them out on photo paper. Then, I take them to a print shop to have them laminated. Grandma loves them! She can easily show off pictures to friends. Bookmarks are easy to mail with Christmas cards, too.
-- Phebe Wall
Memory in a frame
Take a photo of a loved one, choose an appropriate size and purchase a suitable frame. Give the framed photo to that person or someone else who would cherish the memory you have captured.
-- Jo-Ann Raines
Gift rotation
All six of our children are married with kids. To make the holidays affordable, gifts are given family to family on a rotating basis. Each year, each family gives to a different one of the sibling families and then gets from another one of the siblings. Everyone agrees what is fair and keeps to that budget. This has been going on for 10 years and all like it.
-- Anonymous
For many people, Christmas means a severe case of holiday dread, directly tied to a sense of obligation to spend money in order to have a meaningful celebration.
We all know the pain of those credit card bills in January and February. If we've been particularly festive, that pain might even stretch into the spring or summer, or -- yikes -- the next holiday season.
This year the average U.S. consumer plans to spend $817 on holiday-related shopping, plus an additional $107 on "non-gift" purchases of promoted or discounted items, according to the National Retail Federation -- up 3.7 percent from 2006.
At the same time, however, 70 percent of Americans say they would welcome less emphasis on gift giving and spending during the holiday season, according to the Center for a New American Dream.
If you're among those who feel holiday spending is out of control, remember: It doesn't have to be that way. You can start new family traditions or return to some abandoned long ago.
The more you're willing to risk, the more God can use you. And if you're willing to risk everything, then there is nothing God can't do in you and through you (102).
Sometimes taking a calculated risk means giving up something that is good so you can experience something that is great. In a sense, sin is short-changing ourselves and short-changing God. It is settling for anything less than God's best. Faith is the exact opposite. Faith is renouncing lesser goods for something greater. and it always involves calculated risk (106).
Obedience is a willingness to do whatever, whenever, wherever God calls us (109).
Maybe righteousness has less to do with not doing anything wrong and more to do with doing things right (109).
If you were to always act in your greatest self-interest, you would always obey God (111).
(quoting Johann Wolfgang von Goethe): Hell begins the day God grants you the vision to see all that you could have done, should have done, and would have done, but did not do (114).
