I don’t normally get into the Christmas spirit until after Thanksgiving, but as a Christian Living or Devotional author, if you want to publish a book or article with a Christmas theme, you need to write about it long before December 25.
When Victoria Duerstock began writing her Christmas devotional book, Heart & Home for Christmas: Celebrating Joy in Your Living Space, it was the fall so she brought out the Christmas music, peppermint, and hot chocolate a little early that year. Writing through Christmas time was inspiring, but it was harder to stay in the Christmas spirit during the post-Christmas-time editing and rewriting.
Author and blogger Jean Wise from Healthy Spirituality got the ideas for her Christmas devotional, Let Every Heart Prepare Him Room, during the Advent season. Then when Advent was finished, the writing work began.
“I know having first collected my thoughts during the season did help,” said Jean Wise. After Christmas, she continued to listen to Christmas music and lit an evergreen scented candle to help her stay in the Advent mindset.
Kristin Dobrowolski, author and illustrator of Jesus’ Unexpected Family Tree: Anticipating Jesus’ Birthday, had a different take on writing about Christmas. After looking for a simpler version of the Jesse Tree countdown to Christmas, she couldn’t find what she was looking for so she decided to create something herself. A year later she tested her ideas on her own family. Then she and her co-author tweaked and rewrote and designed a test version which she sent to 100 people so they could test it and try it. From that feedback, they redesigned and edited and then released the official book on Amazon last Christmas.
When I asked her how she stayed in a Christmas mood constantly for many years, she said something surprising:
“When you spend years thinking about something, it changes your perspective. It wasn’t about Christmas after a while, it was about the timeline of God’s story and all the people pointing to the arrival of His Son. Those stories of Jesus’ family are something we hear all throughout the year, so thinking about Him was natural. And Christmas is really just the birthday party.”
Blogger Jennifer Love capitalizes on the focus of Jesus’ birthday party by working on her Christmas themed posts between October and December each year. Having these fresh articles ready on her blog, Intentional Traditions, brings a lot of readers at the exact right time they are preparing for Christmas for their own homes.
Keeping Christmas themed devotional writing fresh can be a challenge. When I was preparing to write a short Christmas devotional, I wanted to look at a part of the Bible that is not talked about often. I wanted to challenge Christians to Read the Hard Parts of Scripture since that is the focus of my writing and speaking ministry. Through prayer and Bible study, I discovered that the Bible book of Malachi has a lot of themes that applied to Christmas time. At the end of November, I set aside a large chunk of time to write The Finishing Touches: Preparing for Christmas with the Book of Malachi. I shared it with my email list during Advent, then published it as a Kindle book after Christmas so it was ready to share with readers the following Christmas.
Have you written any Christmas themed devotionals or Christian Living books or articles? How did you keep in the Christmas spirit while you were writing? Comment below!
Rachel Schmoyer is a pastor’s wife who is loving her church life. She writes about the hard parts of Scripture at readthehardparts.com. She has had devotionals published in the past, but now she is looking forward to getting her first Christian Living book published. You can connect with Rachel on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or Pinterest.
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2 Comments
This is very helpful and interesting. I’ve been meaning to write about Christmas for a couple of years now, but just never get around to it. There are a couple of Christmas books I wanted to read and review, but doing it AT Christmastime is just too busy for me. I appreciate your collection of thoughts from multiple authors here. Thanks for putting this together!
If we wamt to be effective and timely sharing Christ’s good news, then we absolutely have to plan ahead of the season and get stuff ready! Thank you for the reminder!