How Can We Teach Kids Contentment at Christmas?

Speaker A00:00:28

Hey, I can still remember those Christmas mornings. Picture this, if you will. It's early in the morning. I'm waiting for my parents to get up. It's like 4am in the morning.Probably the one day a year that mom didn't have to come to my room 10 times to get me out of bed. And I can just picture sitting at the top of the steps. We're waiting for mom and dad to get up. We see the glow of the Christmas tree.We see the toys, we see the gadgets. And of course, as soon as my parents got up or as soon as we woke them up, better way to say it, right.We race downstairs and we're tearing into these presents, the toys, the gadgets. Now, of course, for us, the clothes went into a completely different pile. Those are days I never forget.And it leads me to some statistics we have for today's show. Think about this. We looked at some stats for kids ages 8 to 11. This doesn't shock me at all.73% of kids say receiving gifts is their favorite part of Christmas. Again, that doesn't surprise me. In that age range, 8 to 11, 32% of children under 11 say spending time with family matters most.I don't know about those kids, but that isn't the way I always thought about it. And looking back at it now certainly was the way that I. And that's what's important to me now. But here's the really sad part. It's a Christian show.Only 7% of those kids mentioned the religious meaning of Christmas. That really struck me. We got to do something about that. Which leads me to today's listener question.Ralph, I want my kids to enjoy Christmas, but I don't want them to think it's all about gifts. How can I teach them contentment when the world keeps telling them more is better? Wow. What a great question.And the truth is, I want to start by saying something very bold. Today, kids learn more from what we model than from what we say. And I just want to park there for a second. It's all about what we model.Because if we show peace and we show gratitude, they're going to remember that longer than any president. Well, let's talk about modeling that behavior on today's show.This is Financially Confident Christian, your daily dose of gospel, grounded insight and faith driven tips to help you break the cycle of financial shame with confidence. Welcome to the show. I'm Ralph. I appreciate you joining me today as we work together to break that cycle of financial shame and do it with confidence.We Continue in our series enjoying the Holidays without going Broke. Now, listen, I got some street cred today. I'm a parent myself and I've seen the difference when families focus on giving rather than getting.Let me tell you a story about my family. You're not going to believe this one. My wife and I came to a realization when the kids are pretty young. These kids, we were very blessed.My kids had whatever they wanted. And I started to see like this entitlement growing with my two boys. My kids were young at the time, maybe like five and eight years old.And my wife and I, we were thinking about Christmas presents that year and we sat down together, we said, what can we do to make a dynamic change this year? And I said, you know what we should really do? We should just say to the kids, listen, this year you're each getting one gift from us.And my wife says, how are they going to react to that? I said, you know what, we need to set a tone. They're young enough now that if we set this tone, they'll understand it.So we sat them down and we had come up with an idea. We had seen an advertisement for this, this charity called the Smile Train. And what the Smile Train did, and I don't even know if they still exist.I probably should have looked that up before today. But the Smile Train deals with kids who are born with cleft palate. They have a misformation in the top of their mouth.And they were taking on donations during the Christmas season, which I thought was a great idea. So this is when my wife and I decided we're going to give the kids each one gift. The rest of it we're going to donate.But we pulled the kids together. This is about a month before Christmas. Now picture this.You got a five year old and an eight year old and we say to them, listen, kids, we got some great news for Christmas this year. Here's what we're going to do. I'll tell you what, it was like. I dropped a bomb on them. My oldest son, he was like, okay, Dad, I kind of understand.He's a little bit more mature. My youngest son wasn't having any part of it. He's like, that's ridiculous. I'm used to getting this and that and the other things.And I pulled out that website and I started showing my youngest son some pictures and he started to see these kids who had this cleft palate thing. And he looked at me and he said, dad, man, I was selfish, wasn't I? Now, from a five Year old. I was kind of surprised by that.So the truth is my kids weren't happy at first. But I recognized something. My wife and I had to model good behavior if we wanted our children's dynamic to change.Which leads me to our quote for today. This comes from a fellow named Andy Stanley. And he says, what you model, you multiply. Think about that for a second. What are we modeling?Our children. Because that's what we're going to multiply in them. Which takes us to our question today.How can I teach my kids contentment when the world keeps telling them more is better? So I'm going to talk today about how we can teach contentment.The number one thing I think you've absolutely got to do is you've got to model that gratitude. How do you do that?Well, when kids hear you thank God at the dinner table or maybe in prayer as a family, even for other people and for small blessings, they start to learn by example from that. Because the truth, the kids are like sponges. They model the behavior. They become what you teach them. So start there. Model gratitude.Second thing I'm going to encourage is what my wife and I did. Involve them in giving. Help them choose a charity. Maybe we can do some baking for neighbors. It doesn't have to be that elaborate.Maybe write some thank you notes, but involve them in the process. Kids are excited about that.The thing I will say is kids have a heart for generosity and if you can get them to grow in that, it's such a great thing. Nothing I would encourage you to do is start a service tradition, whether it be volunteering or something along those lines.Listen, during the holidays, this is such a huge thing you can do and it leaves a lifelong impression on your children. Here's another thing you can do, and this isn't easy. Teach contentment.I think in our society, the biggest problem we have right now is this belief that everything is a need. But we've really got to talk openly with our children about needs versus wants. And hey, listen, parents, I'm talking directly to you.You got to understand that yourself and model that behavior in your own life. Especially around this time of year when commercials are rolling in like crazy. This is the time to really be an active parent.Because, listen, you've got to battle that culture, social media, television, all those things. Our kids are getting soaked minute by minute, hour by hour with this more, more, more thing. And you've got to really battle that.You got to explain to them what contentment looks like. Talk about what goes on on Your family. And finally, here's another one. I mentioned this several times in this series.Focus on your presence more than the presence. This is the time of year to think about giving time and attention and laughter.We started out the show talking about that, but the truth is I can't remember the gifts that my parents gave me when I was a young person. But I sure do remember those times spent in front of the fireplace, in front of the TV with my grandparents who aren't with us anymore.Those things are going to outlast anything under the tree, and they're going to remember those things for a lifetime. Let's get into our scripture verse. We actually have two scripture verses today because I couldn't decide which one I liked best.Let's go to the first one. This is From Proverbs, chapter 22:6. Start children off in the way that they should go, and even when they are old, they will not turn from it.So exactly what we're talking about today. Start to ingrain this sense of. Of contentment, this sense of generosity and giving as a young person. And that will be their second nature.And it will reverberate all throughout their life and through their children's lives and your great grandchildren's lives. But here's my other verse for Today comes from First Timothy, chapter 6, verse 18.Command them to do good, to be rich in good deeds and be generous and willing to share. That's really the key, isn't it? Teach it young and encourage them to do good.That's what the scripture is telling us, to be rich in good deeds, not rich in getting stuff, but being generous and willing to share. Why?But we pray together right now, Lord, we just ask you right now to help us set godly examples to our children, examples of gratitude and contentment. Lord, teach me and my family to find joy in giving, not in getting. Help us to battle this constant culture, this noise all around us, Lord.And help us during this holiday season to focus on relationships, those things that really matter for a lifetime over the rewards and the gifts this Christmas. Lord, just give us courage to do that. Give us strength to stand against the evil one who is constantly filling our head with more, more and more.And help us to find contentment in you. And we ask this in the name of Jesus. Amen.All right, listen, I've got a special gift for you today if you'd be interested in getting a free copy of my book. It's called how to Become a Financially Confident Christian.You can get a free copy as a downloadable copy by going to financiallyconfidentchristian.com/becoming. But maybe you're thinking, well, you know what, Ralph? What if I was able to give this as a gift? Well, I've got you set here.If you want to give this book or one of my other two books, here's a link to our Amazon page.You can go to financiallyconfidentchristian.com/Amazon again, that's financiallyconfidentchristian.com/Amazon and hey, you can buy the book, send it to somebody, give it as a gift. It will help them build that contentment in their life. So here's today's action item. I want you to ask your kids just one question tonight.You ready for this? How could we bless someone else this Christmas? Just start there.How can we bless someone else this Christmas, then take one small step this week to make that happen? And listen, be ready for them. Be ready for those negative responses. I certainly got them for my kids. So be prepared for that prayer.Pray about it beforehand and ask God to give you the courage and the strength to do it. Because remember, this Christmas isn't about getting everything on the list. It's about showing our kids that joy lasts longer when it's shared.So I'm going to encourage you right now, model peace, model gratitude, model giving. Because what we live, they'll learn.So go be a financially confident Christian today, stay financially savvy, God bless you, and I'll see you again tomorrow.