Simply Christmas

Harvest of Hope Alternative Gift Catalog

2011-12-07T16:57:00.000-08:00

Although I don’t know of you all personally, I came across your blog while searching for alternative gift opportunities for Christmas. I noticed that you recently posted about alternative gift opportunities such as the catalog World Vision puts out and was thrilled to see how you are spreading the news!

I am an intern for Partners International, a Christian missions partnership organization, and we have an alternative gift catalog called Harvest of Hope where you can donate gifts to those in need around the world (like goats, clean water, medicines, bibles, vocational training, etc). We are trying to get more connected with people like you who are blogging about these sorts of things. We feel that if more people knew about Harvest of Hope (and other great organizations too) we could get more people connected to what God is already doing in the hard places of the world. And we can also perhaps encourage people to give more in general and particularly around Christmas, which has become all about shopping. ;-)

So, I just wanted to reach out and see if you have any ideas or any interest in this. I would be happy to make any information available to you if you are interested to know more or interested in posting something on your blog.

Thank you for doing what you are doing through your blog!

Kylie Grader

Urgent Reply Needed.

2010-01-21T03:58:00.001-08:00

Good Day,

Do accept my sincere apology if my mail does not meet your personal ethics, although I wish to use this medium to get in touch with you first because it's one of the easiest means of communication.

I am Mr.Muhammed Allen, an external auditor of a well known bank here in the United Kingdom.

During the course of our routine auditing ,I discovered a dormant accounts with holding balance of £26,000,000 (Twenty Six Million British Pounds Sterling), which has not been operated for the past six years, after going through some old files in the records I discovered that the owner of the account died without a heir hence the money is floating and if I did not remit this money out urgently it will be forfeited for nothing and the government of United Kingdom will confiscate the fund for their personal use, which I don't want such incident to happen to me being that this is a great opportunity and such opportunity comes once in a life time.

From my investigations and confirmation, the owner of the account was a foreigner by name John Shumejda and he died on the 4th of January 2002 in a plane crash in Birmingham; you can view this CNN link for details on the crash.

Website:( http://edition.cnn.com/2002/WORLD/europe/01/04/england.plane/ )

Since then, nobody has done anything as regards the claiming of this money, as he has no family member that has any knowledge about the existence of the account or the fund, also information gotten from the National Immigration also states that he was single on entry into United Kingdom.

After detailed investigations on the deceased and his account, I found out there is no mention of any heirs or family member on the account documents in the Bank records, therefore the money was lodged secretly into the account.

I have made necessary plans to transfer the fund out with your sincerely support. I have also moved the funds into what the bank call Escrow Holding Account with no beneficiary. Meanwhile as you know I cannot be directly connected to this money for obvious reasons .I will compute your particulars as the beneficiary of the fund deposited in the branch.

I am revealing this to you with belief that you will never let me down in this business, so please reply urgently . I need your strong assurance that you will never let me down in this business proposition either now or in the future.

This transaction is totally risk and troubles free as the fund is legitimate and does not originate from drug, money laundry, terrorism or any other illegal act.

Finally, I will give you 35% for your coporation,5% will be for expenses both parties might have incurred during the process of transferring.

You should Send your private telephone and fax number including the full details of an account where you like the money to be transfer so that my lawyer will write an application to the bank on your behalf for the release of the fund immediately to your bank account . Even an empty account can serve as long as it can recieve money it's still OK. On receipt of your response I will furnish you with detailed clarification as it relates to this mutual benefit transaction.

I look forward to hear from you as soon as possible .

Please reply here using my private email for security reasons {muhammed_allen4@hotmail.com }

Best Regards,
Mr. Muhammed Allen

Charitable Donation Ideas

2008-10-28T11:39:00.001-07:00

There are many wonderful charities that will allow you to gift money in the name of someone.

Many of these charitable organizations allow you to print off certificates that you can use to present the gift. Aside from the certificate, there are other ways of presenting your gift. For example, from Heifer International you can give money that will be used to supply an impoverished family with a small farm animal. To present this gift you could wrap a small stuffed animal that would be a tangible reminder of the money you've given. Or you could present someone with a Bible to represent the donation you've given in their name so that Bibles can be distributed for free. Or you could present a water bottle to represent the money you've given so that clean water can be made available.

We've had so much fun selecting these types of gifts! Initially I thought that they could come across as impersonal, but by selecting a cause you know is dear to the one you're giving a gift to, you can really personalize them.

Jesus says in Mat 25:40 "whatever you did for the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me." Since Jesus tells us that what we do for the least we do for him, giving this way is actually a way to give a Christmas gift to the one who's birth we're actually celebrating, namely, Jesus!

If God lays it on your heart, check out these options:

http://www.heifer.org/

http://www.treesforlife.org/

http://www.wr.org/

http://www.fh.org/

www.kiva.org

(there are so many others too)

Merry Christmas!!

For the blog

2008-09-02T08:04:00.001-07:00

With the four main ideas of “Simply Christmas” being (1) Worship Jesus more, (2) Spend less money, (3) Give more to Jesus, and (4) Love all; Beth and I offer this family tradition that started with her family…

Before opening gifts we all answer the following question, “What has God taught you this past year?” Sometimes this involves sharing about the difficulties, challenges and obstacles we faced and how, “[His] power is made perfect in weakness,” (2 Cor. 12:9). Also, sometimes His greatest lesson for the year was shown through His blessings, grace and mercy.

This tradition has become the highlight of our Christmas and leads to greater worship of Jesus and greater love for each other. If you try it, may God use it to His glory in the lives of your family members.

~Joe Feest

Simply Christmas

2008-08-09T15:53:00.000-07:00

Jesus came into the world to change the world. Born to a singleteen-age mom, he came in humility and in weakness. He chose to take on the body of a human, so that He could live among us, teach us about Himself, and ultimately to die upon the cross. This is the essence of Christmas. But when I look at how I celebrate Christmas, I must confess that at best I give all of this, maybe a passing minute or two. Simply Christmas is nothing more than an idea, an idea to stand against the cultural tide of consumerism so that by spending less we can ultimately give more for Him.

Join us this Sunday as we all will be challenged to rethink Christmas.

-Jonathan