Jon Acuff's Blog, page 158

My person of the decade.

With 2010 almost over, it's time to say goodbye to the decade, a year late. Technically speaking, wasn't 2000 the first year of this decade and 2009, the last? I might be wrong. It's all very confusing. Regardless, I want to tell you who my person of the decade is.

And let's say first of all, you have to say Jesus. In the same way that the Bible is the book you bring to a deserted island, Jesus is who you'd have dinner with if you could have dinner with any person ever. So this other person I think is the person of the decade is in addition to Jesus.

Who is it?

Good question. He actually left a comment on this site today. His comment started with this phrase, "Acuff, speaking as someone who has known you for 25+ years …"

And that is an awesome phrase. What a gift it is to be known. For someone you ate lunch with on the first day of fourth grade to still know your spot on this planet and what you're trying to do with it. I am known by my friends in Hudson, Massachusetts and though I don't do anywhere near a good of job showing gratefulness for that, I consider that a treasure.

But I want you to know the person who wrote that, my person of the decade.

His name is Dave Bruce and his story needs to start from a text my mom sent me a few months ago.

Here is an excerpt of what she wrote:

"Pat told me David Bruce is donating one of his kidneys to Matt. Thought you'd want to know. Love you. Mom."

There are days, maybe even whole weeks where I feel I am living a generous life. There are moments where I feel gracious and humble and giving.

And then there are moments where your mom tells you that your friend Dave is donating a kidney to your friend Matt.

I don't want to over dramatize this, but there is little drama is telling the truth. Matt would have eventually died without Dave's kidney. Dave saved a life this fall. And I never heard about it except from my mom. I sometimes write tweets when I've been generous enough to let someone else in front of me in traffic at the mall. Dave gave away a kidney and didn't say a word. And this wasn't his first superhuman act. During a great family tragedy, he was the glue that bound everyone together at a time when most kids his age are playing frisbee on a college campus.

I know you don't know Dave Bruce, but there's a Dave somewhere in your life too. Someone who gave more than was expected, worked harder than anyone thought possible, cared more than you thought one person could.

Today I just want to say "Thanks Dave." Today, I want to give you some space to say, "Thank you" to your person of the decade. That's it.

How would you fill in this blank,

"Thank you ___________, you are my person of the decade."

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Peeking to see who is raising their hands during a prayer.

A few weeks ago, my wife and I went to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra concert. This was an event that I am still processing both mentally and emotionally. During one of the songs, a lady came out and started throwing down on what could best be described as "rock flute." It was very similar to Ron Burgundy in Anchorman and his jazz flute. It was a completely bizarre instrument to throw into the mix. It felt very arbitrary, like maybe this girl happened to have a rock flute in her purse and just thought, "What the heck? This moment needs some rock flute! Let's do this!"

The only thing I compare that incident to is the time Mr. Marshall, an 80 year old member of my dad's church, brought his own tambourine to service. He apparently found our service lacking in tambo' and although he probably considered that a bit of a "hippie instrument," he decided to bring one unannounced on a random Sunday. Then, during the middle of worship he made his move, walking up to the front of the church, standing next to the worship leader and proceeded to bang away on his tambourine.

Fast song, slow song, it didn't matter. I think at one point he was jangling up the song, "In our house Lord be glorified," which is fairly slow and depressing. Why did he do that? Because sometimes we church members are tempted to help the staff out. To add a little to the service. To tell the pastor, "don't worry, I got this one."

The situation I find myself doing this the most is when a pastor asks people to raise their hands if they've committed their life to Christ that morning. We're all supposed to have our heads down and eyes closed, but I always peek. And according to the end of "Velvet Elvis," so does Rob Bell. Why do we do this?

1. As a service.

I'll double count the numbers for you pastor, to make sure your math is right. Sometimes we do "church math," and report our attendance with a 33% exaggeration. I can't trust your math, so I'll do my own.

2. It's like God's Google Analytics.

Every other part of my day is tracked. I can see my unique visitors, how my Twitter Klout score is doing, how many clicks I've had on my Facebook page. I'm trained at this point to keep tally or score, so when I count hands I feel like I'm helping out with God's Google Analytics.

3. To judge people.

My friend Bethany told me that her pastor recently asked the congregation to pray with him about their church growing. Then he asked everyone to keep their eyes closed and raise their hand if they had prayed for the church to grow. That's an excellent judging opportunity. Who is not raising their hand in that moment? That is an "auto hand up," situation. That's like not giving to a love offering. (As I've said, if you don't put a dollar in a love offering, that's the equivalent of putting in a fistful of hate.) I could totally see someone being tempted to peek during this type of prayer to essentially say, "Let's see which of these punks isn't praying that the church grows."

All three of those reasons are kind of whack, but I don't have to worry because our church doesn't do a lot of "heads down, hands up," moments. (Which when you say it that way kind of reminds me of the song "Da Dip." Remember that one? "I put my hand up on your hip, when I dip, you dip, we dip." So classy.)

But be honest today, have you ever done this?

Do you ever peek in heads down moments?

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Make it a Stuff Christians Like Christmas!

There's still time to add a copy of the Stuff Christians Like book to someone's stocking. It's got over 75 new essays that aren't on the site, it's illustrated so it doubles as a surprisingly fun coloring book, it's got what I [image error]think is the best Serious Wednesday idea I've ever written (Mustard Ice Cream) and it's only $10. You can also get it on Kindle, iPad etc. (My new book, "Gazelles, Baby Steps and 37 Other Things Dave Ramsey Taught Me About Debt" is also aerodynamically tested for stockings.)

Click here to order SCL on DaveRamsey.com

Click here to order on Amazon

Click here to order on Barnes & Noble

Click here to find a Christian bookstore

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The Santa Problem.

Last week, I said three ridiculous things on an interview with a Christian radio station.

Here is what I said:

1. "Alvin and the Chipmunks are Demon Rodents."

The radio show was asking callers if Christians should be listening to non Christian Christmas songs. When one caller said she loved the chipmunks, that is the first thing that came to my head. Clearly I was joking, chipmunks are adorable. (As I mentioned in another post, squirrels in your attic on the other hand are from the devil.)

2. "'Where's the line to see Jesus?' is the 'Christmas Shoes' 2.0."

There's a new Christmas song where a little kid is at the mall and kind of jukes a lady by asking her where's the line to see Jesus since he can clearly see the line for Santa but none for Christ. A caller said she loved the Christmas Shoes song so I pitched her that other one as "Christmas Shoes Part Deux." I stand by that assessment. (Both songs will get played a lot because there are a ton of folks who love them.)

3. "Christmas is the only time you'll hear Wham, Mariah Carey and Christina Aguilera on Christian radio."

It's true, for 11 months of the year, we're not having Xtina on Christian radio, but in December we say to her, "Get over here you rascal and sing 'Oh Holy Night.'"

Looking back on those three things, I was really able to pack a lot of silly into a seven-minute interview. And, we even managed to discuss the problem with Santa. (If you are 6 and inexplicably reading this blog, this is a spoiler alert. Stop reading if you don't want to know the truth about the North Pole.)

One caller said something I have heard often from Christians when it comes to the man in red. She said, "We're not telling our kids about Santa, because when they find out he's not real, they won't believe that God is real when we tell them about him."

Have you ever heard that? I'm not sure if it's a Baptist thing or a Bible Belt thing but this show was out of New York and Canada so maybe that theory is national at this point. Regardless of its popularity though, I think there are two flaws with it.

The first is that in no other aspect of imagination do we put the same constraint. For instance, for a solid year, I'm pretty sure my kids thought the Wiggles and the Doodlebops were real. They watched their shows, they sang their songs, they loved those brightly colored/oddly terrifying characters. And not once did my wife and I say, "When they find out Captain FeatherSword isn't real, they probably won't believe in an all powerful God later on in life." Sure, the Wiggles are different than Santa and we imbue a lot of "belief" language around him, but we only talk about him for six weeks a year. We wiggled for a solid year and discussed the Wiggles far more than we do Santa in an average Christmas season.

Kids are imaginative, that's what they do. If I play along with their American Girl Dolls or take my oldest daughter to a Narnia film and she really believes it, I'm not afraid that I've effectively prevented her from believing in God. We'd never say, "I'm not taking my son to see Lord of the Rings, because if he ever finds out Gandalf is not real, he won't believe in God." We might rail against Harry Potter, but even that is not because we're afraid if they find out Harry Potter is not real our kids won't believe in God.

The bigger issue though with the Santa problem is that I'm not sure it really ever comes to fruition. For instance, I've had dozens of people tell me that they have a hard time seeing God as a loving father because their own father was not loving. They feel stuck and trapped with a broken filter of their own father that they apply to God. I completely believe that happens and have heard it a lot. Do you know what I've never heard? I've never had a friend tell me:

"I want to believe in God, I do, but I can't get beyond my Santa Claus issues. I have 'Kris Kringle complex.' When I found out Santa wasn't real as a 7 year old, I swore off God that day with a kind of a Charlton Heston final scene of Planet of the Apes anger."

No one says that. And we're also not seeing the damage of a generation who grew up believing Santa was real only to learn he's not. By that I mean there aren't any books for adults designed to help you get over your Santa problems. Zondervan hasn't published "Get the man in red out of your head." Thomas Nelson has not published "Empty stocking, full heart." Lifeway is not doing a ladies conference called "Deeper Still Than Santa." There's not an industry to support the thousands and thousands of 30 year olds struggling with Santa Claus, because there are not thousands and thousands out there who do.

Now clearly this will be the moment I hear from the 17 people on the planet who have in fact confessed to a Christian counselor that Santa Claus shotblocked God for them, but I still think we've blown the problem with Santa out of proportion. I think most folks will say that the Santa vs. God thing isn't an issue, but instead that they don't want to "lie" to their kids. I understand that point and know that some kids have said "you lied to me mom and dad," but we also have to be careful that we don't miss out on the word "pretend." I'd never say to my kids, "I don't want to create a house of lies. I need to be honest with you and confess that My Little Pony is simply a lump of hard plastic not a real pony, when I did that magic trick and took your nose, I really didn't take it, and I always know the end of your knock knock jokes but have been living a lie by acting like I didn't all these years. To be perfectly honest with you, 'Knock, knock, who's there, a tornado of spanking' is not that funny. I fake laughed. I hate to say that, but I refuse to lie to you kids."

I think every parent needs to be deliberate and smart about how they handle Santa and Christmas in general, but lets not throw him under the God bus. Don't talk about him for a million other reasons, but I'm not sure the God reason is the best one.

What do you think?

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My pants don't fit. (Or 4 ways to pick sponsors for your blog.)

Last weekend, my wife and I had a discussion about my pants.

Some don't fit right now. When I wear them, it looks like the button might burst off and shoot through an innocent bystander like a bullet. I've probably put on 12 pounds in the last 6 months and I need to do something about that.

That is a weird way to start a post about blog advertising, but there are two things I recently realized. The first is that I haven't done a great job clearly explaining why I've selected the Stuff Christians Like sponsors I selected and lots of folks have had questions. And the second is that over 300 people took me up on my offer to help with their blogs. One of the issues we'll discuss is blogs and advertising.

There are a lot of great ideas out there on this topic. My opinion is simple, writing SCL is my job now. I didn't have advertising for two years or so because it wasn't my job. I worked full time for AutoTrader.com. Now, it is my job. So if I want to pay my mortgage, feed my kids, etc., I need to find honest, smart ways to work with sponsors.

So how do you do that? How do you find sponsors for your blog? I have four ideas:

1. Find sponsors that fit your life.

As previously stated, I need to lose some weight. I need to eat smarter and better. Queso is apparently not a vegetable. I've started working with a trainer and going to the gym a lot more, but changing my eating habits has been hard. So when the chance to work with E-Mealz came up, I jumped at it. Not because I had to or was forced to, but because I wanted to. I want to eat better, they help you eat better. Done and done. Internet Safety was the same way. I've talked on this site a number of times about the toxic nature of porn. Internet Safety makes a software called "Safe Eyes," that filters the Internet. That one was a no brainer. If Internet Safety made accounting software, they wouldn't be on SCL. If E-Mealz made candles scented like the Red Sea, they wouldn't be on SCL.

2. Find sponsors that fit your family.

It wouldn't make sense to work with sponsors who can help pay for my family needs, but are radically different than what my family believes in and cares about. I love the faith and hearts of the E-Mealz team. I believe Internet Safety is doing important work that I have personally seen help dozens of guys. And in a less dramatic, but equally important way, I like that we've partnered with a game company. I've mentioned before my family's love of Skip-Bo. My 5 year old is guru of UNO. Playing games is one of our "media off" moments that is important to my family. So partnering with the folks who make the game "!" made a lot of sense. I have no problem at all recommending that as a Christmas gift you can get at Family Christian Stores. (Particularly when I realized the company had a out.)

3. If possible, meet your long term sponsors.

I've had breakfast, lunch and dinner with the E-Mealz team. My wife and kids were with me two of the times. I hung out with one of the guys from Internet Safety too. Whenever possible, I try to personally know the people who are going to sponsor SCL. I didn't spend close to three years building this site to mess it up with a sponsor who doesn't fit. Now clearly, if you're going to run a small banner ad for a book or something, you won't get a chance to meet the sponsor. But if you're talking about a long term sponsor relationship, try to connect in 3D at some point.

4. Say no. A lot.

Last week we said no to 15 different potential sponsors. We will say no to hundreds in 2011. Why? Because money isn't worth wrecking the SCL community. So if your product or company is out of line with what's going on with SCL, it won't ever be featured on this blog. Be hyper careful about who you work with when it comes to sponsors. Say no. A lot.

Those are four of the ways I look for sponsors. And regardless of if you've got a massive blog or a small blog that's just looking for that first sponsor, I think these ideas are true.

Most of this is new to me, and I am bound to make mistakes. I apologize for not explaining my sponsors in a clear manner until today. I'll hopefully get smarter and even better at this stuff in the future. Thanks for being patient and gracious with me while I figure this all out.

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My 40 before 40 list.

Tomorrow, I will turn 35. That's not a bad number. It's divisible by both 7 and 5. It was Phil Niekro's number and "the Nigerian Nightmare," NFL running back Christian Okoye's number. All in all, a pretty respectable number.

But it also means I have only 5 years until I am 40. With that in mind, I came up with a "40 before 40" list of all the things I want to do before I hit that age. Here is what I came up with, in no particular order of importance:

My 40 before 40

1. Run a marathon

2. Raise a total of $500,000 for charity.

3. Have a song I've written recorded

4. Write and publish 5 books.

5. Help L.E. Acuff complete her 10 before 10 list (Which she already wrote on her own and includes jump roping 100 times in a row.)

6. Help McRae Acuff complete her 10 before 10 list.

7. Help Jenny Acuff complete her 40 before 40 list.

8. Take dance lessons with my wife. Preferably tango.

9. Sell 500,000 copies of books I have written.

10. Consistently weigh my ideal weight.

11. Visit the kindergartens Stuff Christians Like readers built in Vietnam.

12. Run a half marathon in less than 2 hours.

13. Speak on an international tour.

14. Go to that tomato-throwing event in Spain.

15. Co-write a book with my daughters.

16. Hike part of the Appalachian Trail.

17. Learn how to make sushi.

18. Raise pre-teen girls who are so full of their parent's love that they don't feel compelled to fill their heart with things that will hurt them.

19. Get a book I wrote on the New York Times Bestseller's List.

20. Teach my kids to play Disc Golf.

21. Spend fall weekends in Blowing Rock, North Carolina.

22. Take my family to Cinque Terra in Italy.

23. Go to a recording of Saturday Night Live.

24. Visit my uncle's orphanage in Kenya.

25. Spend two solid weeks at the beach with my family.

26. Take my kids on a zipline.

27. Own a dog.

28. Go to a World Cup game.

29. Spend New Year's Eve in New York.

30. Have a library in our house. (Possibly with a ladder upon which I sing by the time I'm 50.)

31. See U2 in concert again.

32. Do something savvy enough to be mentioned in Fast Company

33. Help 100 people build 100 amazing blogs.

34. Build another kindergarten, hospital or school in another country.

35. Spend an increasing amount of time with God and a decreasing amount of time with distractions.

36. Listen to more classical music.

37. Have a group of guys who love me enough to tell me when I'm being an idiot.

38. Take our kids on a cross-country road trip.

39. Go surfing.

40. Take my kids to the American Girl mother ship in Chicago.

It's not a perfect list and I'm sure some will change in the years to come.

But what is something on your list? If you had a 20 before 20 or a 25 before 25 or a 50 before 50, what would you put on it?

What's something you want to do?

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Winners of the 12 Days of Fantasticalness!

Two weeks ago we held a bunch of awesome giveaways as part of the launch of my new book, "Gazelles, Baby Steps and 37 Other Things Dave Ramsey Taught Me About Debt." (Which still makes a great gift at only $10 and should be purchased in triplicate if not just by the case.)

Today, I'm happy to announce the winners of all the prizes. (Everyone who bought the book during the "I'll review your blog" promotion will be getting a review after Christmas. It's hard to connect with everyone during the holidays.) Click continue to get the full list.

Winners:

iPod Nano = Bryan Simpson

The Stuff Christians Like Awesome Pack = Lisa Brubaker

Black Wii = Karen Mitchell

An original SCL guest post on your blog = Kathy Martin, Keith Cotton, Walter Bartlow

$200 of Dave Ramsey store goods = Lydia Wroth

16G WiFi iPad = Kara Proctor

Congrats to the winners! We have your addresses and will send you the prizes. Thank you all so much for supporting the book. I'm still working on something to support international readers and will announce when the new book is on Amazon.

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Christmas Program Scorecard

(Next week we'll be going to the Christmas Eve Eve service at Cross Point. Yes, I meant Eve Eve, as we'll be going on the 23rd, which is kind of like the "pre-party" of Christmas. I was going to say, "pre-game," but that felt a little too Four Loko. The Christmas Eve service is very different from a "Christmas Program," which "Some Guy" is about to prove in a great guest post. Enjoy!)

It's getting to be that time of year when churches across the country, across the world even, think about how to best impress everyone.

That's right, I'm talking about the annual Christmas program competition. Not the Christmas service that your church does only on Sunday morning, but the programs that are meant to rival Broadway productions.

Okay, okay… it might not be an official competition. But there are only so many families out there, and they're going to go to only one Christmas program each. So churches have to step it up for the big show. In preparation for all this, I present to you this scorecard. This will help to rate whichever Christmas show you do end up watching. Or, if you're putting together a show, this may help you make it even better.

The Christmas Program Scorecard:

1. It requires tickets: +3 points

2. The tickets cost money: -1 point for every $10 of face value

3. They remember that you got tickets last year and they send you a flyer with information about this year's show: +3

4. …and they email you too: +1

5. …and they call you: -5

6. …and someone in a sweater that has real bells attached to goes door to door to sell those tickets: -10

7. They have extra signs in the parking lot to direct traffic: +2

8. They have people throughout the parking lot directing traffic: +1 for each person along your route

9. They have people wearing festive Christmas elf hats: +1

10. They have people wearing God-focused wise men outfits directing traffic: +10

11. They have people throughout the parking lot collecting the parking fee: -1 for each dollar

12. The coat rack is right next to the front door, creating a logjam of people: -2

13. The one person helping expedite the coat rack is "Chatty McChatterson," completely slowing down your egress: -5

14. There is a program/bulletin with the list of scenes: +2

15. …and it lists an intermission: +3

16. One of the songs is "Happy Birthday Jesus": +1

17. …and it is a solo by a little girl: +1

18. …and she hits all the notes: +3

19. The manger scene has real animals: +5

20. …and they enter from the back, walking down the aisles to get to the stage: +1 for each animal

21. …and one or more of them get out of hand and cause a scene: -1 for each audience member hurt

22. …but someone films it and it blows up on youtube and makes your church, "Internet famous" for four days: +10

21. The manger scene has the three wise men: -3 (because they arrived years later, that's why)

22. …who are carrying real gold: +1

23. …and frankincense: +2

24. …and myrrh: +3

25. You even know how to tell real myrrh from fake myrrh: +5 points for yourself

26. The angel who delivers messages to Mary/Joseph/shepherds descends from above the stage on some sort of precariously rigged harness system: +3

27. The whole angel choir descends from above: +1 point for each angel

28. The pastor goes on stage just before the final song/scene and thanks everyone for being there: +1

29. …and tells them how to learn more about the church: 0 points (required element)

30. …and launches into a 45 minute sermon: -1

Scoring:

0-10 points: Tryouts

Maybe they just started having a Christmas program, bless their hearts. It might have been a decent show, but keep scouting because there are better shows out there.

11-24 points: Minor League

The church is working hard and trying to make it. It might be a fun evening for the family, but it won't get a contract unless it improves.

25+ points: Big League

Now this church knows how to put on a show! You had better hope that the success doesn't go to its head and it starts demanding to be traded to Miami.

Did I miss any required elements? What do you wish churches did more of (or less of) in their Christmas programs?

(For more great stuff from Some Guy, check out his blog.)

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Grace online. (Or 4 People I have a hard time loving online.)

The other day, someone tweeted to me and said,

"And that makes about 18 tweets in one day. Sorry guy, but officially unfollowing."

First of all, that person is indeed correct. I tweet way too much. Not only that, but I am the worst kind of Twitter person. Because I will lull you into thinking I'm not going to tweet much that day. A few hours before I was issued that public unfollow, which is the middle finger of Twitter, someone else asked if "@jonacuff was OK?" because I had not tweeted in four hours. See how I do it? I trick you into thinking there aren't any tweets coming and then I unleash a tweet tsunami all at once that probably includes at least three jokes about the show "Swamp People."

I completely understand if you unfollow me though, I do tweet a ton and that can be annoying. That seems pretty open and shut as far as web dilemmas go, but there are a few other online situations where it's hard to decipher what the best Christian response is. We've already talked about the Christians who apparently hate to use Snopes.com, but here are 4 other people I struggle with:

1. The friend who asks you to be Google.

Have you ever had a friend that wants you to be his personal Google? He calls you at work and will say, "Hey, when is the Ticketmaster pre-sale for that U2 concert in Nashville?" You don't work for Tickermaster. You are not in U2. So you do exactly what he could do from the cubicle he is sitting in. You Google it. What's Christian protocol in this situation? Can we all just agree that when someone does this, we can reply with a curt, but polite, "Google it?" Unless they're not at a computer or are in their 90s, they should probably be able to do that pretty easily.

2. The friend who changes their email every week.

I have a friend who is on his third email address in three weeks. He didn't get fired, he just wants to find the perfect email provider. So, over the last few days I've received the "Would you please update your address book with my new email address?" I want to be honest, at this point, I just don't believe him. I want to, I do, but as Oprah says, "Past behavior is an indicator of future behavior." He's not going to stay with Gmail. Eventually it will let him down, they'll have an argument, he'll storm out and run to the tender digital arms of Yahoo Mail. I can't keep going through that emotional rollercoaster. What's our move in this situation?

3. The friend who starts a fake Facebook account for their baby.

I didn't know this existed because none of my guy friends do this. If my friend Bill called me and said, "Hey, our baby is going on a crazy rant about diapers on Facebook, you've got to check it out," I would hold a social media intervention for him. But it turns out some folks are doing this. They'll start a Facebook page for the baby and then post status updates like, "I'm cranky today. My mommy didn't give me a long enough nap so now I'm fussy!" Then the baby's mom will respond to the status update she herself just wrote and say, "We had errands to run. I'm sorry you didn't get a long nap, but mommy needs you to go to bed on time tonight!" I don't really even know where to start with this. I can kind of understand folks who do it with their pets. There's a cat that has over a million Twitter followers. Maybe you're doing it as a social media experiment. Regardless, I still don't endorse your dog, inevitably named "Rusty," tweeting, "When my owners are at work, I look for bacon and things to chew on. Like shoes!" How do we handle this one?

4. The friend who writes the entire email in the subject line.

I can't believe I almost missed one, but fortunately a guy named Josh reminded me of this practice. Sometimes people will write their entire email in the subject line. I understand if it's just a one word response like "yes," or "no." But I'll get emails with subjects that say, "Give me a call, I need to find out how we're going to meet up for dinner tonight at that sushi place downtown. Parking might be an issue." That is asking an awful lot of a subject line. It's designed to contain a highlight of what's inside the email, not the entire email. It's a "subject line" not a "story line." What's our plan to "love on" the friend who does this?

There, I feel better already, although I do fear that your baby might put me on notice on his Facebook page. Maybe he'll say something like, "Jon Acuff makes me mad like pureed peas!" Fair enough, fair enough. But I should warn you, there's an above average sized pigeon I see in the parking lot at work sometimes and I'm starting a Facebook account for him. And you might assume blue jays have the most profane arsenal of verbal insults in the bird kingdom, but you'd be mistaken. It's above average sized pigeons.

How do we be kind online?

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Guest post from Tim Elmore

(The other night, my kids argued about who was better at brushing their teeth. That one was challenging. On the one hand, I don't mind that they are being competitive about not getting cavities. I had an emergency root canal on Monday. I want our kids to avoid that kind of thing. On the other hand, they were yelling at each other. These kind of situations happen a lot at our house, which was why when author Tim Elmore said he'd write a guest post for me for free about peacefulness in kids at Christmas, I said yes. Click continue to check out Tim's advice.)

Growing Peacefulness in Your Kids at Christmas

I just saw something amusing. I was recently in Michigan, driving through a shopping mall parking lot to pick up some cold medicine. As I drove by, I noticed a handful of men dressed up like Santa's elves. They were large men holding up signs of Christmas cheer — words like "Ho, Ho, Ho" and "Joy to the World." One of the elves caught my eye. He was angry. He was yelling at a driver in the parking lot. I mean — he was doing everything opposite what I imagine Santa's elf would do: Ranting and raving about something this driver had done — perhaps missing a stop sign or driving a bit too fast. Whatever it was, everyone within forty yards heard the big elf. I thought a fight might break out. But, alas, something better happened. The elf stopped screaming and walked back to his position on the sidewalk… carrying his sign that read: "Peace on Earth." (Imagine if he had broken that sign over somebody's back? And the guy who gets beat up by an elf, how do you live that down? You can't tell that story at a party.)

It's ironic isn't it? Christmas — the celebration of "peace on earth, good will to men" and the entrance of the "Prince of Peace" — is often the most hectic, chaotic time of year. Most of the time, we fail to experience peace because we have cluttered our calendars. We're running at such a fast pace, we're unable to enjoy peace, inside or outside. So how do we cultivate peace in our homes at Christmas?

Try this.

Sit down at the kitchen table and talk about the value of "peace" in our lives. Then, contrast it with your schedules throughout the fall. Perhaps, especially during the holiday time. Together answer these questions: Why do we let ourselves get so busy? How does it negatively affect us?

Then, look at your daily schedules. Mutually decide what "clutter" could be cleared off the calendar to make room for a little peace. Don't force anything — let your kids help decide what can be removed and what should stay. But once you cut some activities, choose together what you'll do with that open space in your calendar. (Hint: Don't add more noise and activity.) What about reading the Christmas story again and talking about the peaceful first Christmas. Sit back and relax a bit and soak in the peace before the hectic holiday.

"And He shall be called Wonderful, Counselor, Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace…" (Isaiah 9:6)

(Tim will be posting on Tommy Newberry's blog tomorrow. You can find more from Tim at his blog and his twitter account.)

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