One final “Christmas In July” post for churches…
Christmas is a time when many of even the most forward-thinking people lean towards “old fashioned” traditions, music, decorations, and even food. It’s a normal human reaction to look back and remember meaningful times, places, events, and people.
Long story short, don’t worry about going out of your way to be “innovative” this Christmas. I learned that one the hard way. One year, we had had enough of trying to make what we considered to be the “old guard” happy. We were going to do something different, by golly, so we came up with a look based on snow white modernistic vaguely-Christmas-tree-shaped decor pieces and created a striking set (and even custom ornaments based on the look). It was new. It was cool. It was different.
It failed. People didn’t storm out, but it was clearly the least-liked set that we had created in my decade at the church. It wasn’t just old people, either – they were actually kinder with their comments than some of the younger ones. What happened?
We had messed with something that people – regardless of age – didn’t want messed with. So don’t make my mistake. Invest time and effort to make Christmas services excellent, and use your creativity – while remembering that sometimes it makes more sense to paint within the frame you’re given.
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