In Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, Ebenezer Scrooge begins with a humbug attitude toward Christmas, too disinterested and miserly to invest in even a small contribution to the holiday cheer. His attitude threatens to ruin Christmas. By the end of the story, a fresh generosity overcomes his scroogie-ness, and Christmas is saved. Yay!
The same kind of thing happens in The Gift of the Magi. A financially destitute couple named Jim and Della fear they have nothing to give, again risking the ruin of Christmas. But they each find a way to sacrifice a prized possession to buy the other a Christmas gift. Yay!
In Little Women, the March Family feel the pinch of poverty after Mr. March makes a poor financial decision. A nearby family, the Hummels, has nothing to eat on Christmas morning. What happens? You guessed it! The little women share their own Christmas breakfast with the Hummels, and the season becomes merry and bright. Yay!
Do you see the theme? Giving makes the holiday merry and bright.
You Might Ruin Christmas
The theme of sacrifice and generosity, having little and digging deep, feeling as if we have nothing to give, but pushing through, gives us all the feels. Wrap it up in Christmas, and we have a classic in the making. I love it!
But wait . . . is that the way Christmas really works? What if you don’t have anything to give? What if exhaustion or grief or sickness or even sin holds you back from cheerfully adding yourself into the classic Christmas plot? Is your Christmas Scrooged? Have you ruined it for everyone else?
No, of course not. Weakness or exhaustion or poverty or sickness or the myriad other hard things we face in December cannot ruin the Christmas story.
We Need Christmas
We work hard to make Christmas perfect under the low hum of fear. We are afraid that if we don’t get it right, we might ruin Christmas. After all, Christmas needs me. Right? What would happen if we didn’t cut down the perfect tree, buy the perfect presents, make the perfect cookies, and act like the perfect family? How can we celebrate Christmas if we don’t get everything just right?
Actually, the Christmas story is not at all about us getting Christmas right. If you don’t meet any of the Christmas conditions, Jesus will still be King. The gospel will still be good news. God will still be good. Your soul will still be saved. Your life will still be in God’s control, and his eternal, loving, merciful, and cheerful disposition will still rest on you. Christmas will still be merry and bright, even if you fail.
No, Christmas doesn’t need us. But, rather, we need Christmas.
And, my friends, that’s how Christmas works. That’s how salvation works. God meets the conditions of the covenant AND gives us the covenant promises by his own generous sacrifice, not by ours. Christmas is a parable of our hope in Christ.
So does that mean we should tear down the lights, return the gifts, and put away the tree? Not at all. The real Christmas story doesn’t leave us lethargic, but instead it inspires us to do all those good things, but for the better reason.
Instead of doing all the holiday things because we’re afraid that our failure will ruin Christmas, we can freely do all the holiday things because Jesus has guaranteed that no one and no thing will ever Scrooge Christmas. Even when you have nothing—and I mean nothing—to give, Jesus remains true to his promise to be with us. He is our Emmanuel.
Rejoice in The Unstoppable Grace of Christmas
Rejoice in the truth of God’s unstoppable grace this Christmas (Ephesians 2:8–9). Meditate on the ultimate reality that the incarnation of Christ, his perfect sacrifice, his powerful resurrection, his present help by the Spirit, and his promise to come again stands at the center of your life (John 1:14, Hebrews 10:12). When you feel tired, troubled, and like you can’t give anything else, rejoice in the good news of Christmas. Jesus is God with us. He will never leave or forsake his people.
I Want to Escape: Reaching for Hope When Life is Too Much
When life overwhelms, it’s natural to try to get away. Escape holds a powerful allure amid hard times. Even though we have many good reasons for trying to escape, as Christians, we have even better reasons to depend courageously on our Savior in the ups and downs of life. Pastor Rush Witt helps us learn to bravely run to Christ instead of running away.
