All I Want For Christmas Youth Study: Opening the Gifts of God's Grace

By James W. Moore and Cindy Klick

From the time the Wise Men came to bring gifts, Christmas has been a time of giving gifts to our loved ones, to the less fortunate, to the church, to favorite charities, to family, to friends, and even to our pets. In the best spirit of Christmas we give and receive Christmas gifts, remembering the greatest Christmas gift of all…God's gift of the Christ Child, God's gift to us of a Savior.

As we give and receive Christmas gifts, it is incredibly important to remember that the best Christmas gifts are wrapped in heaven. Unfortunately, sometimes we concentrate so much on the gifts we want to give to and receive from each other that we miss the special gifts Christmas has for us. Christmas has some amazing gifts for us, but the truth is that we need the miracle of God's grace to see them, feel them, hear them, wrap our arms around them, and celebrate them. This study asks a very personal question: "What are the gifts you would really like to receive from Christmas this year?" And that is what this book is all about: our thoughts and ruminations about the amazing, life-changing gifts Christmas has for us!

This Advent study has five sessions: one for each Sunday of Advent and one for Christmas. Leaders and participants work from the same book, which includes readings for reflection, a host of age appropriate teaching-and-learning activities that groups can choose to fit their needs and setting, and a short devotional reading for each day of the Advent season.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Abingdon Press
• Release date: Sep 20, 2016
• ISBN: 9781501824265

James W. Moore

James W. Moore (1938–2019) was an acclaimed pastor and ordained elder in The United Methodist Church. He led congregations in Jackson, TN; Shreveport, LA; and Houston, TX. The best-selling author of over 40 books, including Yes, Lord, I Have Sinned, But I Have Several Excellent Excuses, he also served as minister-in-residence at Highland Park United Methodist Church.

Book preview

Week 1

The Gift of Good News

Matthew 1:18-25

This is how the birth of Jesus Christ took place. When Mary his mother was engaged to Joseph, before they were married, she became pregnant by the Holy Spirit. Joseph her husband was a righteous man. Because he didn’t want to humiliate her, he decided to call off their engagement quietly. As he was thinking about this, an angel from the Lord appeared to him in a dream and said, Joseph son of David, don’t be afraid to take Mary as your wife, because the child she carries was conceived by the Holy Spirit. She will give birth to a son, and you will call him Jesus, because he will save his people from their sins. Now all of this took place so that what the Lord had spoken through the prophet would be fulfilled:

Look! A virgin will become pregnant and give birth to a son, And they will call him, Emmanuel.

(Emmanuel means God with us.)

When Joseph woke up, he did just as an angel from God commanded and took Mary as his wife. But he didn’t have sexual relations with her until she gave birth to a son. Joseph called him Jesus.

Unwrap the Good News

good news: n. someone or something that is positive, encouraging, uplifting, and/or desirable

In his book Through Painted Deserts, Donald Miller summarizes this succinctly: It confuses me that Christian living is not simpler. The gospel, the very good news, is simple.¹

Extra, Extra! Read All About It!

The way we see and hear the news has changed a lot, even in the fewer than two decades since you were born. If you watch old movies such as The Paper, Citizen Kane, or All the President’s Men, or study the history of journalism, you get a sense of the urgency of print news when it was the best source of information. Today the Internet and social media make us aware of what’s going on in our neighborhoods, with our favorite teams, and across the globe within moments.

Much of what we hear or read today is not good news at all. On any given morning, the headlines on our favorite websites or the old-fashioned newspaper announce the latest school shooting in the United States, terrorist-inspired violence in another country, or the financial ruin of a large company or famous individual. It’s easy to have our sensibilities saturated by sadness so much that we choose to turn off the news. We no longer feel the impact of terrible tragedies in the same way we once did because bad news comes so often.

Good News Travels Fast

Imagine sharing the good news of Jesus’ birth in a time and place when travel anywhere, walking or by donkey, took days. There was no postal service to deliver the birth announcement and no chance to interrupt this broadcast for . . . and certainly no Twitter feed (#tinyking). The good news was delivered by an angel in Joseph’s dream rather than by a uniformed messenger at the front door. And the miracles just kept happening.

News traveled fast enough to King Herod, who, in Matthew 2, became nervous about what the birth of the Christ Child would mean to his reign. He lied to the magi, sending them as his advance team to find the baby. It took twelve days and the help of a star, but the wise men honored Jesus appropriately, not knowing of Herod’s insecurities. More dreams, this time experienced by the magi as well as by Joseph, helped keep Jesus safe from Herod’s plot to have him