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Editor’s note: This blog is from our friends at Igniter Media. They provide over 300,000 professionally made video and graphic assets to thousands of churches, making their communications more visually appealing and inviting.
We all feel it. It’s that time of year again when the leaves and seasons change and the transition begins from summer time to the holidays. In the church world, there’s a lot of anticipation that comes with this special time, and when October hits it's typically time to kick planning for Christmas into high gear.
This entails many things, and ultimately you want to communicate your plans to both your congregation and those outside of your church who may use this time of the year to visit for the first time. But before sending out any announcements, there’s several key elements that require some attention.
A few questions you should start asking include: What's the theme for this year? How will it set the stage for Christmas? How will visuals enhance this theme? How will the congregation transition from the regular routine to the festive atmosphere? And importantly, how will all of this be communicated?
Remember, the Christmas strategy isn't limited to just the day itself. It's about the weeks or even months leading up to it. The prelude is as significant as the celebration.
With all of that said, we’ve separated all of this out and organized it so you don’t have to. We’ve also included some really helpful resources from Igniter and our friends at Subsplash that we think will help your church cut out noise this season and get things done faster and more efficiently.
So how about we start with the thing that’s going to trickle down into every part of your Christmas strategy: The theme.
Determining the theme for your church's Christmas service is necessary if you want to create a cohesive and impactful experience for members and visitors alike. Establishing this well in advance, often months before December, will help you and your team weave a consistent narrative throughout various aspects of the service and beyond, from musical selections and sermon topics to visual aesthetics and promotional materials.
Starting this process early provides ample time for brainstorming, planning, and coordination among various teams and ministries, ensuring that every element resonates with the central message intended for the service. Moreover, when a clear theme is introduced ahead of time, it becomes a beacon that builds anticipation among the congregation.
As the festive season approaches, the gradual unveiling of themed decorations, announcements, and sneak peeks can stir excitement, drawing more attendees and deepening their engagement with your church. All in all, a well-thought-out theme acts as both an anchor for the service and a magnet for the community, enhancing the overall experience and building anticipation for the Christmas service.
Here’s a few theme ideas that we’ve seen churches build around include:
Once you've settled on a theme for your Christmas strategy, understand that this is just the starting point. The subsequent step is to flesh out and expand upon this theme, essentially crafting a visual and thematic blueprint that will underpin your entire Christmas approach.
This theme doesn’t have to be limited to your sermon content or what’s on your screens. This is the season that you can let it permeate every corner of your church, from the entrance to the altar. Think of it as a golden thread weaving through every element. Decorations, lighting, and even hymn choices should be influenced by and reflect this central theme.
Your communication channels, whether newsletters, bulletins, or social media updates, should consistently echo this theme. The objective is to maintain a unified visual and thematic narrative throughout, offering your congregation a synchronized and immersive experience.
Recognizing the challenges of the season, Igniter is here to assist. We understand that crafting custom graphics for sermons, social media, live streams, and other visual media might be overwhelming, especially during the festive period.new
Explore some theme ideas on our site to inspire your visual plan:
Special offer: Download a FREE Winter Wonderland Christmas Design from Igniter Media!
Now that you have the theme and you know what it’s going to look like, it’s time to bring it to life! Again, you want to keep this consistent and coherent with everything else. From the physical experience in your church building and on-stage to the digital experience on your screens and through your livestream, it should all be cohesive and work harmoniously with the theme and the visual plan that you’ve decided on. Let’s walk through all of that.
On your screens:
The looks you use during your service can be the thematic centerpiece for all of your Christmas season visuals and experiences—on and off-stage. Coordinating them with your print materials and church decor can ensure a cohesive experience that ties into the theme.
This is also where you decide on the actual look of your service and set the tone of the theme you’ve chosen. Do you want a modern, traditional, or somewhere-in-between look? Are you going for tranquil and peaceful or bright and joyful? Will you observe advent leading up to Christmas? Then you may want a collection that includes both Christmas and Advent title graphics so you can keep the cohesive look.
Check out our Christmas collections for full sets of related media you can use to that end.
On their screens (live stream):
Now you also will want to translate this look to your live stream. This can be incorporated through using pre-service media such as a countdown or sermon bumper and also through incorporating themed lower-thirds graphics, which are included in most of our title graphics on Igniter.
Now that you know what you want it to look like, how are you actually going to execute it? There are so many resources out there now that make it way easier than it used to be. One of our favorite resources is Subsplash who has simplified the process of broadcasting your content to multiple outlets and engaging with viewers through Live Stream Chat—all in one place.
During worship:
As you gradually reveal the theme and build to Christmas in your building and on stage, your worship set should do the same thing. Start by blending in a few Christmas carols into your worship set in November. When December arrives you can transition your worship to vibrant sessions with classic carols, ensuring the worship experience remains immersive.
The strategic use of Christmas lyric videos and thematic backgrounds during this period can also unify and elevate the entire worship atmosphere, drawing the congregation deeper into the Christmas spirit.
Just released: NEW Christmas Lyric Video Collections on Igniter!
On the stage & in the building:
Again, everything is telling one story. Think of the decor as your theme “spilling outside of the screens” and on to the stage and in the building (maybe even into the parking lot!). Whether it’s objects like Christmas lights, trees, or candles; aesthetics like rustic, traditional, or minimalist; or even just colors, look for visual themes you can repeat in different contexts and with different mediums.
A powerful implementation of this—and one that makes your job easier by not having to execute all at once—is to start building toward your finished experience during Advent. This might mean you finish out one area at a time, or it might mean you start more bare, and weekly fill in elements until you get to Christmas morning, when your completed vision is fulfilled.
Last, but certainly not least, is planning out your communications and invitation strategy. There are three sides to this: internal team, church members, and your community.
Internal team:
The first thing to consider is how you will communicate to your internal team, staff, and volunteers to ensure everyone is on the same page at all times. Once Christmas planning starts rolling, it’s hard to slow down.
So before communicating anything externally, make certain everyone knows what their role is and what will be executed in the coming months. This is where you will communicate how many services you're hosting, where you will need volunteers (probably everywhere), and what each staff member will be in charge of.
Church members & community:
Once you have your team synced, you can begin planning out your communication to your church. For your current church members, if they’re attending regularly, the obvious way they will find out about your Christmas services will be in person.
Your church members are also your best resource when it comes to inviting new people into your church. In fact, the Billy Graham Association conducted a national survey where 82% of the unchurched said they would come to church with a friend or relative if invited.
So encourage your congregation to invite one person to Christmas this year, and provide them with resources on how to do that. Maybe that’s giving them a small trinket to give to someone that they want to invite, or encouraging them through an equipping session on how to share the gospel and invite someone to church.
Don’t neglect digital:
Digital communications are also a really important part of creating awareness and interest among people who have never been to your church. This includes email, social media, website, in-app communications, and SMS messaging—just to name a few.
If you have your own communications or social media team, you should start creating your content calendar now, discussing your digital strategy, and what it will look and feel like. Remember everything in your Christmas strategy ties together, so when you’re deciding on the graphics, colors, and messaging ensure it still ties it back to your theme and visual plan.
A few examples of what your content calendar could include are: announcements, engagement posts, event teasers, reminders (through social, email & SMS), invitation graphics and reels, and post-event follow-up messages.
We realize that’s a lot to manage, especially if it’s one person in charge of all of it. We’d recommend looking into a management software like Subsplash’s Church Management Software to help you keep volunteers and staff organized, build out your email sends, communicate to members through SMS text and in-app push notifications, as well as check in on your church engagement through activity analytics.
With all of this said, what’s really important is to ensure that your Christmas service is created with your community in mind. Those who have never been to your church should feel welcomed and cared for, from the parking lot to the service, and even post-service interactions. A big part of ensuring that happens is good communication and organization that eliminates as much confusion and potential obstacles among your team as possible.
Perfection is not the goal here, but being unified as a church and effectively communicating the gospel and the story of Christmas is.
So church, we challenge you to think through everything about your Christmas planning strategy this year and how you can help your congregation and those outside of your church understand the meaning of Christmas on a deeper level. Which really starts where we began, figuring out the message and theme you are communicating this Christmas season.
