The website Statistic Brain has tracked the "must-have Christmas gift" for the past few decades.<\/p>\n\n
In 1983 everyone had to have a cabbage patch doll. In 1985 we just had to have an $18 Pound Puppy. In 1989 American households scrambled to get a new Game Boy, followed by the 1995 Beanie Baby craze, and the 1996 Tickle Me Elmo frenzy.<\/p>\n\n
In the ensuing years American consumers knocked themselves out to buy the following top yearly must-have Christmas gifts: a new iPod (2002), A Wii (2006), a Kindle (2010), the Angry Birds Board Game (2011), the Doc McStuffins doll (2013), the Frozen<\/em> Sing Along Elsa Doll (2015), in 2020 it was The Child<\/em> (also known as Baby Yoda), and in 2023 the latest must have gift for boys was Legos and for girls it was Barbie.<\/p>\n\n Possible Preaching Angles: (1) Salvation, gift of<\/strong>—Getting these "must-have gifts" often required an enormous amount of scheming to obtain the limited supply of gifts. In sharp contrast, God's gift of salvation in Christ is free and available to all. (2) Consumerism<\/strong> – The items change every year, but the spirit of consumerism remains.<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":0,"template":"","tax_ctp_audience":[],"tax_ctp_authors":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[165],"tax_ctp_format":[171],"tax_ctp_illustration_types":[410],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[446],"tax_publications":[140],"tax_ctp_tags":[3387,3497,3600,4051,4232,4877,4878],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-40911","sermon-illustrations","type-sermon-illustrations","status-publish","hentry","tax_publications-ct-pastors","tax_ctp_tags-advent","tax_ctp_tags-birth-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-christmas","tax_ctp_tags-gift-of-salvation","tax_ctp_tags-incarnation-of-christ","tax_ctp_tags-salvation","tax_ctp_tags-salvation-by-faith"],"acf":{"scripture_references":[{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null},{"first_verse":null,"add_second_verse":false,"second_verse":null}]},"yoast_head":"\n