So, be honest—have you ever said, ‘This Christmas will be different!’ only to find yourself drowning in wrapping paper and Pinterest ideas by December 10th? Yeah, we’ve all been there. But what if it really could be different this year? Yes, it is early November and I’m talking Christmas – because I believe that we as parents need to put in the prep so that we can enjoy December as a season of Christmas.  So today, is my first Christmas episode for this year – and I’m starting with the importance of guarding our heart.  What we put in our heart will shape our actions – so we need to be very intentional in setting our hearts desires when it comes to Christmas.  If we want our children’s hearts to be in the right place on Christmas day – our hearts need to be in the right place as well.  So today I’m talking about how you can guard your heart as you start to think about Christmas.

A Truly Heart-focused Christmas Starts With Guarding Your Heart

My goal for Christmas has always been that we focus on Jesus, that we love other people, and that we enjoy each other as a family.  I wanted to enjoy the celebrations without getting caught up in the commercialism, I wanted to make traditions without losing sight of the true meaning of Christmas – which is Jesus.  

Jesus is the reason can be a clever quip – or it can be a reality.  

How we do Christmas, and how we preapre for Christmas is what makes the difference.  For us to have a heart-focused Christmas it all starts in my heart (and by that I mean it all starts in the heart of the parents – mum and dad both). 

I use the word heart-focused in nearly every episode and that is because understanding the significance of the heart changed my parenting, and gives me the words to help you in your parenting.  But it is important that we are on the same page when I say – heart-focused.  It is not talking about a connection we have with our child, nor is it about doing everything around our child’s emotions.

The heart is the place where we hold beliefs, values, passions, and emotions, it is the place where we process and make choices. So the idea that Christmastime is to be heart-focused, simply means, that all things we do at Christmas line up with what we believe and value. And of course, as Christian parents, Jesus is right at the center of that!  But I also believe that Jesus came to give us life here on this earth – so we could walk in the garden with God every day, so we could enjoy his creation, so we could do the tasks he gave us to do.  And part of that life – is family. So a heart-focused Christmas is more than remembering Jesus, and yet it is all because of Jesus.  Because of Jesus we have the freedom to enjoy life, and have fun, and create memories with our children – and Christmas is such an opportunity.

Keeping My Heart Right this Christmas

I have two slogans that I want to share with you today.  They are just two sentences that keep my heart in the right place as I prepare for Christmas.

The first one is:  

If the things of Christmas take all my time, then I am planning to do too much.

I have tried with the best of them to do an elaborate Christmas.  I usually stumble somewhere around the first week of December – I realise I’m not going to achieve ½ of what is on my to-do list.  Unfortunately – the world won’t stop just because it is Christmas time. We still have our normal lives to live. The normal responsibilities, the normal commitments, the normal day to day family life still needs to happen even though Christmas is getting closer.  

When my to do list becomes my focus my heart gets all crunched up and out of whack.  When I’m focused on my to do list I’m always looking ahead – always planning towards THE day.  Not today. Nothing is about today – it is all about Christmas Day.

That level of focus and intensity is not sustainable, but neither does it help us create the type of Christmas that I really want to create for my family.

It is not sustainable because if we move our focus from our kids and their hearts to preparing for a big party then sooner or later our kids are going to start playing up, (this isn’t necessarily my story these days with grown up kids!  🙂 ) But when my kids were younger – when I was not available for them I found myself taking one step forward, two steps back as my kids didn’t fit in with focus being fully on my Christmas plans.

The lesson I learnt was if I took it slow, if I had realistic expectations, if I  included our kids in preparing for Christmas then we actually made the time and space for memories to be made.  Memories are made as we live in the present, as we become aware of others, and as we give to those around us.

Our Christmas plans need to take into account the season of our family. Every season has opportunities and limitations – and discontent or distraction settles when we ignore the season of life we are in right now.

So consider your plans for Christmas and how distracted they make your or how discontent they make you.  Think about the things you may need to change, or tweak, or let go of – for this year.

Heart Focus Christmas starts with Me

The second quote that keeps my heart in check is a Christmas prayer that I wrote many years ago. It goes like this:  

Lord help me keep my spirit gentle, my house peaceful and my heart full of love.   

Keep my spirit gentle…

I’m not necessarily what you would call a gentle person.  I have strong opinions and I want to get things done. But I can choose to do this forcefully, abruptly, harshly or I can do things with love, joy, grace.  

• I can be a gentle person – it means that I watch my tongue, I watch my tone because unguarded words hurt people – hurt my children.  
• It means I let the stress of the day roll off my shoulders – I choose to not take offense.  
• It means I’m nice to be around – pleasant even.  It means I have self-control and use my manners.  
• It means I am helpful and generous, I’m not demanding, angry or loud.

This is a high ideal to attain.  

When life gets busy I can only be pleasant, I can only be gentle if I spend time in God’s presence.  When I spend time with him my priorities get sorted, I no longer strive to have the best decorated table, I no longer focus on who is doing what down my street – instead I am focusing on Jesus – what he has done for me, and what he requires of me.  He requires me to love Him and love others. He requires me to honour him in all that I do. He requires me to focus on the heart not the externals.

I can only do it when I rely on the Holy Spirit and keep my focus on God and His life in me instead of all the things of Christmas.

Keep my Home Peaceful…

So keeping my heart gentle, keeping my heart in the right place has a huge impact on the atmosphere in our home.  Christmas is all about atmosphere isn’t it – especially in the northern hemisphere where there is snow and warm fires and hot chocolate.  We don’t have that type of Christmas here – it is very very hot, humid, likely to have a tropical thunderstorm and there is always flies. But I can still create a atmosphere in my home.  And as my prayer says – I want to create a peaceful atmosphere.

A peaceful atmosphere starts with a peaceful heart – and as we’ve said, a peaceful heart starts when we are in relationship with Jesus.  

To me a peaceful home is a welcoming place.  It a place of refuge, safety, calm in the midst of a crazy world.  

We will all create a peaceful home in different ways – some might always have music playing, some might like the quiet.  Some might always have the smell of cookies wafting through the house, others may enjoy mangos and watermelon. Some may have little kids and therefore toys and legos scattered across the floor – others may have a nicely decorated home.  Though our stuff can add or distract from the seemingly peaceful atmosphere in a home I know that true peacefulness comes from the ability to connect with people and meet their needs.

For me, a peaceful home is where people are welcomed.  Where people find rest from the crazy world. Where people can be themselves. What does a peaceful home look like to you?  Don’t try and copy my home, or a home atmosphere that you see online – but ask God for a definition of peace that you can hold onto and let that define your home.  

Keep my Heart full of Love…

The third part to my little prayer is ‘a heart full of love’.

These three things are really so closely woven in with each other – how do you separate gentleness, peace and love from each other?  They feed each other, they depend on each other and they help each other be expressed. You can’t really do one without the other. Gentleness, Peace, Love.

At Christmastime and the weeks leading up to it, I need to remind myself to keep my heart full of love for God, for my husband, for my kids and for others.  This really hits the motivation for why we do anything at Christmastime.

I remind myself that I celebrate Christmas because I love God, I love my family and I want to show His love and my love to others.

Busyness often distracts us from any one of those relationships – and as we spend less and less time with each other it becomes harder to know how to express our love in the midst of the crazy going on around us.

We need to guard our relationships as we start to get busy with all the activities and preparations we have going on as Christmas gets closer.  

Three questions

1. Are you finding time to think about God during the day?
2. Are you finding time to touch base and be a blessing to your spouse?
3. Are you finding time to be heart-focused with your kids? That is teaching and encouraging their beliefs, values, and choices.

This then flows back to my first slogan – if preparing for Christmas is taking all my time – I am planning too much!  It is a really good test to see where my priorities are.

Heart-focused Parenting Action Step

The action step I’m going to encourage you to take this week is to sign up for my free email course – 6 Days to Create a Heart-Focused Christmas.  Every day a short email (and action step) will land in your email to help you think through why you are going to celebrate Christmas and how you can best do that this year. Each email will help you decide what is going to work best for your family this year in the season of family life that you are in. 

Hi there! I'm Belinda and I'm glad you are here!

I am a family life coach and help parents to raise their kids with faith, values and life skills in a way that is intentional, relational and heart-focused. Read more in my Introduction page

You can learn about heart-focused parenting through my podcast, blog and weekly email (Heart Boosters).

If you need help you can book a coach call or email me here.

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