Lamplighter Article on the Advent Conspiracy

  • Nov 15, 2008

The following article was written by Neighborhood Church member Ginger Spickler for the December issue of The Lamplighter, Cooper-Young's monthly newspaper.

In the coming weeks you will be able to read the article online at http://cooperyoung.org/lamplighter.asp.

 

 

Thanks a lot, wise men.  Or should I say wise guys?  You loaded up the camels and set off to see Baby Jesus, but not without first packing a few thoughtful tokens of your admiration.  You know what I call that?  Precedent.  You guys set it, and now, two thousand years later, I’m stuck getting a gift card for the dog groomer. 

Okay, so maybe the gifts of the magi were actually thoughtful – gold, frankincense and myrrh symbolizing Christ’s royalty, divinity, and death respectively.  And truly, I do want the people in my life to know that I love and appreciate them during the Christmas season.  But somewhere between the wise men bringing the Christ child the treasures of the ancient world and me wandering listlessly around Macy’s looking for something my dad won’t shove in the back of his closet on December 26th, I think we might have lost our way on the whole notion of Christmas gift-giving.

But how do we get back?  Precedent is a powerful thing, after all.  But Advent, the period in the Christian tradition during which we wait expectantly and prepare for the celebration of the birth of Jesus, was never supposed to be about scouring the mall for useless gifts.  And that’s why my family, along with many members of our church, is turning to the Advent Conspiracy movement to help us focus our attention back on the true meaning of Christmas.

Advent Conspiracy started just a couple of years ago when a few churches decided to test out a simple premise:  if they spent less on gifts, they could give more to those who truly needed it.  That year, more than half a million dollars was raised for local mercy ministries and global clean water initiatives.  In 2007, the idea caught on with more churches and some $4 million was diverted from the cause of ugly ties to that of serving the underprivileged. 

Want to be a part of the conspiracy?  Here’s how it works:

 

Worship Fully.  That holiday we celebrate on December 25th?  It’s about Christ.  (See?  It’s right there in the name – Christmas.)  As the Advent Conspiracy website says, “It’s a season where we are called to put down our burdens and lift a song up to our God.  It’s a season where love wins, peace reigns, and a king is celebrated with each breath.”  

What if you don’t consider yourself a Christian but still think scaling back on the stocking stuffers sounds like a good idea?  Well, please join me for the next three bullet points.

Spend Less.  Notice I didn’t say “Don’t spend.”  No one is expecting you to throw away your Christmas list for your family and friends – Scrooge is not exactly an inspirational holiday figure.  But do I really think my four-year-old son will notice if he has one less present under the tree?  Probably not.

Give More.  Presence, instead of presents, that is.  What most of us want more than anything you can buy at Brookstone is time with the ones we love.  So think about ways to give relationally – take Dad to a Grizzlies’ game – just the two of you, spend an afternoon with Mom organizing (and laughing at) family photos, or help your daughter make a gift for Granny.  It’s much more likely that these will be the gifts you’ll remember for years to come – certainly more so than the . . . uh, I can’t really think of anything I got last year.

Love All.  And here’s where the equation comes together to add up to a more meaningful Christmas for everyone.  Approximately 1.6 billion people worldwide don’t have access to clean water.  It is estimated that it would take about $10 billion to solve this lethal problem.  Americans spend $450 billion every year at Christmas.  Which means that if everyone spent just 2% less on fruitcakes and big-screen TVs, we could save 3,900 children who die each day of water-borne illnesses. 

Or consider the fact that the 38126 zip code, the one that encompasses the Cleaborn and Foote housing projects near FedExForum, is one of the poorest in the country and is located just minutes from Cooper-Young.  Think your money or time couldn’t make a difference there this Christmas season?  

So, here’s what my family will be doing this year to participate in Advent Conspiracy – we’ll be sending our holiday greetings via email instead of snail mail.  My girlfriends and I are scaling back our typical frivolous $5 gift-for-each-person, to a frivolous $5 gift-for-one-person, and will spend our annual Christmas dinner discussing which charity will be the beneficiary of our restraint.  Our son will paint ornaments for the grandparents, who will be so misty-eyed that they won’t even notice that my father-in-law’s annual Steinmart gift card (the man loves to shop, what can I say?) is a little smaller this year.  All savings will go to charities local and global.

Care to join us?  The box below describes a few of the events Neighborhood Church is planning to help take Christmas back from the credit card companies.  You can check the website at www.ncmidtown.com/advent for more details.  But even if you don’t want to make ornaments, bake cookies, or raise a toast with us, consider how you can use the Christmas season to give relationally to those you love and sacrificially to those you may not even know.  My guess is the season will be all the merrier for it.