December 10: "Nothing Like the Present"

MESSAGE

Finish this sentence: Christmas just isn’t Christmas without . . .

What are your favorite traditions that make Christmas special?

Treasured ornaments hanging on a beautiful tree? Heirloom decorations on the tabletop or mantle? Lots of shiny, wrapped presents under the tree? That big inflatable Santa on the front lawn?

What about cookies burning . . . I mean baking in the oven? Or a frantic, last-minute trip to Walmart to buy a present for someone you forgot? Or, how about watching the movie “A Christmas Story” at least twice on Christmas Day while still in your jammies?

For me, Christmas just isn’t Christmas without the hustle and bustle of Christmas Eve services. I love those services, and I love going home around midnight on Christmas Eve and relaxing in the afterglow of the carols and the candlelight and the fellowship, with my cats curled up beside me, looking at the lights on my tree.

This is the first time in five years that I set up a Christmas tree. You see, when you have cats, sometimes putting up a tree is an exercise in futility. But my cats are a little older now, so I thought I’d give it a try. And, so far, so good! The tree is still standing and all the ornaments are still in place.

There’s something about shiny, flashing, and moving objects that cats just can’t resist. I want to show you one of my favorite commercials. You may have seen it around this time last year. Let’s watch:

Cute, huh? I read an article about how that commercial was made. It took three weeks to train the cats, five days to build the set, and three days to film. According to the creative director, filming cats can be a challenge because cats are so easily distracted. They had to keep the set almost perfectly quiet and still so the cats would focus on what they were trained to do.

But the fact that cats are so distractible is the point of the commercial: if you keep your kitties busy, and distract them with cat toys, catnip, and kitty treats, then, maybe, just maybe, the mischievous little hairballs won't wreck the place.

You know what? We humans are easily distracted, too. It’s so easy to get distracted by all the trimmings and festivity and glitter of Christmas. And it’s even easier to get distracted by the way our society tries to convince us how to “properly” celebrate Christmas. That’s the message that bombards us, from TV and movies and Walmart and the mall and the internet: if you really want to do Christmas right, you’ll go out and buy presents and ornaments and inflatable Santas and tons of lights.

Now, there’s nothing wrong with those things. I mean, who am I to criticize decorations and lights? You’ve seen the parsonage, I’m sure.

But one big problem with all this is the subliminal message that if you don’t or can’t trim a tree or deck the halls or shop till you drop or have a large family feast, then you’re a Scrooge who doesn’t know how to do Christmas “properly.”

Ah, yes. You remember Ebenezer Scrooge. We’ve talked about him for the past couple of weeks, about how he was filled with bitterness, and how he summed up his feelings about Christmas with those famous words, “Bah, humbug!”

In the beginning of the story, “A Christmas Carol,” we learn that one of the things that made Scrooge so angry at Christmas time was that other people tried to tell him how he should be celebrating and how he should be feeling. His nephew, the men who come into his counting house to ask for donations for the poor, even people on the street – they all told Scrooge he should be merry and joyful, and he should be filled with love and compassion for others. But, as Scrooge angrily told his nephew, “You keep Christmas in your own way, and let me keep it in mine!”

Scrooge refused to live up to the expectations of other people. He would not feel merry or joyful or compassionate – he would not deck the halls or sing carols or enjoy family parties – simply because people were expected to do those things at Christmas time.

Instead, he was totally focused on himself, and his own desire to completely ignore Christmas. In fact, because Scrooge was so wrapped up in his own bitterness and unwillingness to feel any kind of holiday cheer, he couldn’t even begin to understand how other people, and especially those who were poor, could possibly feel merry and joyful. When his nephew greets him with a cheery “merry Christmas, uncle!” Scrooge responds by saying, “Merry Christmas! What right have you to be merry? What reason have you to be merry? You're poor enough.”

For the past two weeks, we looked at the first two parts of the story of Ebenezer Scrooge, when he was visited by the ghost of Jacob Marley and the first of three spirits.

Last week, we saw that the Spirit of Christmas Past took Scrooge on a journey through his own past, reminding him of the joys and sorrows of own story.

Today, we look at how the next spirit, the Spirit of Christmas Present, takes Scrooge on a journey outside his own small world and into the lives of other people. And along the way, the Spirit challenges and confronts Scrooge’s self-centeredness and his ignorance of other people’s lives and situations.

It seems clear from the way Charles Dickens describes this part of Scrooge’s adventure with the spirit that Scrooge had never really traveled outside his very small world – a world that consisted of his counting house, his home, and the dreary tavern where he often ate his dinner.

So the first thing the spirit does is take Scrooge through the parts of London where the poor people lived: through dark, gloomy streets where the houses were coated with a layer of soot from the chimneys and the air was filled with a dingy mist. Scrooge noticed that there was nothing cheerful in the appearance of this part of town. And yet . . . and yet, he noticed that there WAS cheerfulness in the way the people called out greetings to one another, and in the way they laughed heartily as snowballs went flying through the air, sometimes hitting and sometimes missing their intended targets.

The Spirit then leads Scrooge to the home of Bob Cratchit, Scrooge’s clerk, who is paid a paltry fifteen shillings a week. Bob’s small, four-room house was home to Bob, his wife, and their six children. As Scrooge and the Spirit watch, the family finishes the preparations for their Christmas feast – a small, barely adequate goose with a few side dishes, and a tiny baked pudding for dessert. Scrooge notices the family’s threadbare clothes and meager furnishings. Surely, Scrooge must have thought that this wretched scene of poverty was evidence for what he had said to his nephew: “What reason do these people have to be merry? They’re poor enough!”

And yet . . . and yet, Scrooge watches in wonder as the family shares joy, gratitude, and happiness for what they have, as measly as it may be. He watches as the family wishes one another a most merry Christmas, and he hears Tiny Tim call out, “God bless us, everyone!”

The lives of the Cratchit family stood in stark contrast to Scrooge’s own life in so many ways. He was wealthy and lived in a good part of town. They lived in a tiny house in the poor part of town. He lived by himself and yet had enough money to provide for a large family. Their family of 8 made do with the pittance of a salary that Scrooge paid Bob Cratchit. He had no joy, no desire to be merry, in spite of his abundance. They were filled with joy and a deep gratitude for God’s blessings in spite of their poverty.

Perhaps for the first time in his life, Scrooge was forced to look outside his own experiences to see how people from very different circumstances lived and celebrated Christmas.

It is this experience of stepping outside his own little world that causes the first small spark of compassion to be lit in Scrooge’s cold and unfeeling heart. Scrooge notices the tender love that Bob Cratchit has for his son Tiny Tim, who is small and weak and uses a crutch. And something stirs within him.

“Spirit,” said Scrooge, with an interest he had never felt before, “tell me if Tiny Tim will live.”

“I see a vacant seat,” replied the Spirit, “in the poor chimney-corner, and a crutch without an owner, carefully preserved. If these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.”

“No, no,” said Scrooge. “Oh, no, kind Spirit. Say he will be spared.”

The first flame of compassion is ignited in Scrooge when he leaves his comfort zone, enters into the lives of the poor people around him, and observes their experiences first-hand.

One of the main messages of Christmas is that, in Jesus, God enters our lives with compassion, mercy, and love. And Jesus, in turn, made it clear that anyone who would follow him is called to do the same thing. Jesus told his disciples, “You will always have the poor with you.” By this, he didn’t mean that there will always be poverty. Rather, he was saying that being a disciple means entering into the lives of others, and especially those in need. Being with them, learning about their experiences, and sharing in their struggles, their concerns, and their joys.

At the end of his time with the Spirit of Christmas Present, Scrooge notices something sticking out from under the spirit’s long robe. When he asks the spirit about it, the spirit pulls his robe aside to reveal two children, thin, wretched, and miserable, clinging to him.

Scrooge was appalled and asked, “Spirit, are they yours?”

The spirit replies, “They are Man’s. This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, and all of their degree, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased.”

The spirit pleads with Scrooge, and God pleads now with us: Beware the kind of ignorance of other people’s lives and experiences that allowed Scrooge to wallow in his own self-centered concerns and bitterness.

The remedy for the kind of ignorance that keeps us focused on ourselves and our own joy and happiness is the kind of compassion that stirred in Scrooge’s heart – compassion that comes from stepping outside ourselves and our comfort zones to learn about and really share in the lives of others. Compassion that comes when we don’t let the decorations and the presents and all the other trimmings distract us from remembering that Jesus came into our world not amid glitter and festivity, but in poverty, in a humble manger.

I encourage you, this Christmas season, to find a way to enter into the experience of someone whose life is very different from your own, so you may become more aware of how other people live and work and celebrate; so, like Scrooge, compassion may be kindled anew in your heart; and so, like Tiny Tim, you will be compelled to say, “God bless us, every one.” Amen.