Recovering Christmas

A Yuletide Retrospective

I always loved Christmas. As a child I would crawl into bed with a tense and churning stomach each Christmas Eve in anticipation of the joyous bounty the morning was sure to bring. And Santa never disappointed. The month following would consist of discussions like poker games with friends - I'll see your He-Man sword and raise you a Robotic T-Rex. The victor, in this case, already had the spoils.

It did not strike me until much later what an irony those mornings were. My family, and a host of families like mine, was clear that Christmas was to be a celebration of Jesus - a Jewish craftsman who chose a life of wandering poverty and charity. Looking back it seems at very best a thin, shaky connection between our seasonal excess and this historical man who embraced poverty as a lifestyle, perhaps an ethic.

It took several trips to poor parts of the world to wake me to our cultural doublethink, and since then Christmas has held a fair amount of ambivalence for me as I watch many people disregard Jesus' values to celebrate his birth. But this year I believe we have the opportunity to change.

Santa's Got A Whole New Bag

The anthem of change has been lifted from campaign events on all sides of the political roundtable - a soundtrack to the presidential election. The economic meltdown has sent our leaders scrambling to develop changes that will refound us on solid ground. We have reached a point in our nation's history at which the need for cultural change has become widely evident.

The Christmas season began with a retail blitz, as it does each year, on the day after Thanksgiving - Black Friday. The name itself is unsettling. And this year's melee held an even darker omen - as the first WalMarts on the east coast opened, a temporary security guard at a New York WalMart was trampled to death by shoppers made inhuman by their hunger for bargains. Since then it has become clear that this Christmas is de facto different. People are uneasy riding atop this tumultuous economy and have held their purses and wallets more closely than recent years. It's a change we can build on.

One Vision For A New Christmas

Jesus' teachings were largely about love - of God, of neighbors, of enemies - about what this love looked like in the context of a life, and what a kingdom founded upon love might look like. In celebrating his birth we celebrate his life, his teachings, his purpose. Giving needless gifts to our friends and family in this context is non sequitur. It reminds me of a quote I heard from a famous Jazz musician: "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture." Giving video games for Jesus is like killing ants for Buddha.

Here's one idea for a Christmas that would honor Jesus. Throughout the year, as you engage in and experience acts of love, the type of love that Jesus taught, write them down, journal them, blog them, remember them somehow. Then, as Christmas approaches, plan a way to share them with your friends and family. Write a story or a song, make ornaments that honor them and tell their stories as you hang them, have a time of sharing these stories over Christmas dinner, and remember together how Jesus' life influenced yours. Invite the other people involved in these stories to Christmas celebrations. Join together in marvelling at how a first century Jewish man could have such a profound impact.

And perhaps plan an act of love to carry out on or near Christmas. Use the money that would have gone to unneeded presents and meet a need that is deeply and truly felt by someone you know, or someone you could know.

If you are committed to celebrating Jesus during Christmas, give it some thought. I can't wait to hear what you come up with.

Merry Christmas.