Church Christmas Ideas

Church Christmas Ideas

Ho,  ho, ho: Christmas is coming! It’s one of the two times per year when your church is most likely to have guests. It’s also a big celebration in its own right. How is your church going to welcome visitors and celebrate? We’ve got your church Christmas ideas ready.

How to Get Started:

We’ve got a lot of Christmas resources to share, so let’s start simple:

1. Free Resources

We’ve got lots of free Christmas articles below, but allow us to highlight a few free resources:

  • 30 Days of Planning Christmas: We’ll send an email every day for 30 days with helpful Christmas content. It’s a great way to kickstart your planning process and generate ideas and encouragement. Sign up now >>
  • Christmas Welcome Kit: Grab our free Christmas welcome kit to make sure your guests truly feel welcome.
  • Photo Checklist: As the big day approaches, you’re too busy to think about details. Our free Christmas photo checklist can help.
  • Social Media Graphic: Grab a free Christmas social graphic and check one more thing off your to-do list.

2. Read the Book

God Rest Ye Stressed Communicators: Planning Christmas for Your ChurchWe wrote the book on Christmas planning. Seriously, it’s called God Rest Ye Stressed Communicators: Planning Christmas for Your Church. It’s full of practical ideas and examples to help your church spread the love and joy of the season.

It’s a good place to start, if we do say so ourselves.


The Christmas Opportunity

“Christmas is filled with opportunity. You can pull off some amazing things because people’s hearts are already there.” –Gary Molander

“Think inside your box. Let your limitations fuel your greatest creativity.” -Wade Joye

More Christmas encouragement videos:


Church Christmas Ideas & Resources

We’ve got loads of Christmas resources to help your church. We’ve separated them into three different areas to help you find what you need:

  1. Planning and Promotion
  2. Ideas and Examples
  3. Over-Christmased

1. Planning and Promotion

Your church Christmas ideas need to be planned in advance and promoted properly. Don’t just wing it or think that because it’s Christmas the people will just come.

Christmas in July (or Whenever You Start)

Is it too early for Christmas? It’s never too early to start Christmas planning.

We explored Christmas in July, asking half a dozen church communicators their thoughts. This can be helpful, no matter when you start your planning:

More Christmas Planning and Promotion Ideas

Here’s even more help as you start your planning process:

 “If you could do nothing else but read from the Gospel of Luke you would be communicating the greatest story of all.” –Shawn Wood

2. Ideas and Examples

Getting inspired with church Christmas ideas can be tough, especially if you’re doing your planning and it’s anything but Christmas outside. But we’ve got plenty of examples and inspiration to get you motivated. But don’t just steal these ideas, use them as a starting point to get you thinking. Be inspired to create something unique for your church.

Telling the Christmas story with 600+ Instagram photos is a great start:

  • 25 examples of what makes Christmas special at different churches.
  • Check out this roundup of Christmas ideas including mini disco balls, holiday parades and importing snow to Arizona.
  • A Wisconsin church shares how they made Christmas work on half the budget.
  • Try passing out Christmas survival boxes to encourage people to invite friends and family.Church Christmas Ideas: Heaven on Earth - Christmas Series
  • One church offers a Christmas service to bless families.
  • “We’re going to serve our community for 12 days during Christmas. We couldn’t think of a better way to express the true heart of Christmas.” –Stephen Brewster
  • One church organized flashmobs to support Salvation Army Bell Ringers and an organization that fights human trafficking as part of their unexpected Christmas series.
  • Chuck Scoggins shares what his church has done for Christmas and how it’s changed over the years: “As you’re planning Christmas, think about what it is your community needs your church to be.”
  • Church Christmas Ideas: Jesus Born to Save designChurch on the Move offers a commentary track of their entire Christmas service, explaining what they did and why they did it.
  • New Life Church ditches their multi-week Christmas series in December and focuses on Christmas Eve.
  • Christmas designs from the Church Marketing Lab: 2013, 2012, 2011, 2010.

Learn more about how this video came together.

“As you’re planning Christmas, think about what it is your community needs your church to be.” -Chuck Scoggins

3. Over-Christmased?

As we get closer to Christmas and the stress ramps up, be sure to keep things in perspective:

“Who cares if your Christmas festivities are worthy of Broadway if your entire church staff is cold, tense and irritable because of an unhealthy hyperfocus on performance? … Happiness is contagious. Enjoy your Christmas.” –Kent Shaffer

If the Christmas cheer is a little too much, maybe you need to step back.

Animated Christmas Light Display of Jesus Being Flogged


Free Christmas Graphic to Share

Go tell it on the social media mountain with this free Christmas graphic:

Free Christmas graphic to share on social media.

We hope your church Christmas ideas come together, and we wish your congregation a merry Christmas.