Spend Less, Give More. Substitute consumption with compassion. What a radical, countercultural concept! Not sure how you can make it work in your life? Well, here are some great ideas and resources for you to get started:
Some Great Links on ways to Spend Less and Give More:
Ideas for Spending Less:
The Christmas Contract:
Decide in advance how much will be under the tree with a Christmas Contract. Every person in the family can get a pre-determined group of gifts using fun categories:
- One special gift for each person.
- One new thing to wear.
- A new book to read.
- A gift-card to your favorite place.
- Something good to eat.
- A new family game to play.
- A special place to go together.
You can control spending in advance by carefully selecting the categories. Once gifts have been purchased, you are finished. Put the credit cards in the dresser drawer, put your hands in the air, and slowly back away.
The Gift Exchange:
To further curtail spending, secretly draw names from a bag. This works well in large families where there is not much money to spend. Each person selects a name from a bag and secretly buys a present for that person. This breaks the pattern of having every person in the family buy a present for every other person.
The $20 Gift Challenge:
Put a limit on the amount of money spent on each person. It doesn’t matter the figure (the figure of $20 can be adjusted), the fun is to see what can be brought with this
Make your Gift:
Today we can buy just about anything we want and find it comes in twenty-nine colors. It’s easy to say, “Here, I went to the store and bought this for you; they even wrapped it for me.” The rare gift is the one that is custom made by the person who gives it. Think about how you can make Christmas special by a gift you will make yourself. Maybe its a homemade scrapbook of memories. Maybe its a homecooked meal for a busy family.
Ideas for Giving More:
The Belated Thank You Letter :
For each of your relatives, recall a memory with them from your youth in which you never said thank you. Each letter can be unique, or can simply be started with “I remember when I was younger” and then proceeded to write down as much about that memory as you can. At the end of the description, simply thank them
Give your time:
Volunteer in the community or practice a random act of kindness to your neighbor. Maybe there is someone who you never really met that lives next door-a senior that may need help with leaf raking, a single mom that might need some help with cleaning, or someone who is struggling with health problems that might need someone to do their laundry.
Gifts to Jesus:
Decorate/wrap a box and label gift card ‘gifts to Jesus’. Write down acts of kindness on a piece of paper and place it in box during Advent or all year long. On Christmas, open box and read these gifts to Jesus.
Give Fair Trade Gifts:
Purchase items that will help to end the cycle of poverty. Trade as One, Bead for Life, or Equal Exchange.
Donate a gift in honor of friends or loved ones:
For those that don’t really need anything for Christmas, donate to your favorite (or the giver’s favorite) charity through sites like Gifts that Give Hope . This allows you and others to give in a way that will give hope to those who aren’t on anyone’s gift list.
These are just a few of the ideas. Don’t forget to visit the helpful links above. There are a multitude of ways that you can Spend Less and Give More this Christmas Season! Also, you can download the Boycott Xmas Booklet and Idea Guide Here:
Boycott Xmas Booklet and Idea Guide
Do you have a great idea to share? Please post it below for others to see. Check back frequently for more ideas!
This year, I want my boys to know their family in a very special way. I want them to know the faith that fills their family. So this Christmas, I asked only this…that my family would write their salvation story. My hope is that our relatives would share with my boys what was going on in their lives that lead them to accept Jesus Christ as their Savior. I encouraged them to include and special thoughts or verses that are meaningful for their faith walk. Truly the greatest gift that they can offer to me this year was writing their story for my boys, and someday for their children.
In the spirit of giving more, here are some community needs that really could use some support.
Community Homeless Outreach Center – CHOC is a daytime drop-in facility that provides a safe haven for chronically homeless individuals to rest, shower, launder clothing and receive help with accessing human services. By meeting basic hygiene needs and connecting clients with existing service providers, CHOC serves as a single point of entry for chronically homeless people to start along a path toward permanent housing and stable lives. From July 2008 to July 2009, the daily average number of visitors more than doubled, from 40 per day to 85 per day. BY THE END OF JANUARY, CHOC WILL RUN OUT OF MONEY AND WILL HAVE TO CLOSE.
In addition, food is still and issue in Lancaster County- I ask everyone to give to the local food banks. Plus, don’t forget-we will be having our annual Christmas Eve food drive. Bring in a bag of groceries, and we will take care of getting the food to local food pantries.
[...] We hope to fill our sanctuary tree with the Building Hope ornaments, to serve as a reminder of the beautiful gift we can give to our sisters and brothers in Kenya, all in the name of Jesus. This is just one way that you can [GIVE MORE] and [LOVE ALL] this Christmas! For more ideas on how you can Worship Fully, Spend Less, Give More and Love All-click here [...]
Love Jar: Start saving all of your loose change in a big jar, now and throughout the year. When you have accumulated a full jar, place the jar anonymously on the front door of someone who could really use it.
Through a referral from Love INC, I have been visiting a 77 year old widow every week who lives alone. I spend time with her, help her with grocery shopping, taking her to doctor’s appointments, and sometimes we just go for a drive. It has become the best part of my week! I have the best time with her and feel so blessed that I am able to help her. I work full time and have a very busy life, but taking this time out of my busy schedule has become such a blessing to me and to her.
[...] All it takes is some thought, prayer and maybe some ideas from others. Check out the post on Spend Less, Give More. Download the Boycott Xmas Booklet and Idea [...]
One thing my wife and are doing for Advent this year is an Advent Prayer Calendar. We made a list of all of friends, families, ministries, countries and concerns we’d like to pray for and put them on the calendar. Each day we make sure to include those specific things in our prayers. I’m also making it a point to contact some of the people on the calendar and offering words of encouragement and thankfulness for what they mean to me.