Christmas 2007

Welcome to "Dead Week," the week between Christmas and New Year's Day. I'm on the job, working from my underground lair. Got a marketing mailer done yesterday. It's ready to go out on January 2.

I've been trying to think of something to write about Christmas for about two weeks. When I was a kid, I was powered up about Christmas, like most kids are. Since my family existed on an auto mechanic's income, it wasn't like we got presents every week, so Christmas was a pretty rare occasion.

It was all about the goods and very little about God when I was a kid. Nowadays, in my old age, it's more about God and less and less about the goods. Christmas arrives shrouded in impenetrable expectations. Everything has to be perfect. Here in Iowa we kick off the joyous holiday with the annual stress about The Roads. It's like they're like huge black cobras waiting to rise up and kill you. We all hope The Roads are good for the holidays. By that we mean that we hope the roads aren't covered in ice and snow causing us to skitter into the ditch and be killed on our way to grandma's house. They almost never are, but still we worry about it. Because that's what we stoic Midwestern types do -- we worry.

Then we expect the perfect meal and a great time "visiting" (chatting with relatives). Wedge in some church visits here and there, crank up the thermostat to 87 degrees and, bam, Christmas. (Two things a rural Midwestern family CANNOT HAVE -- running out of food and anyone even slightly chilly in their houses. So there is usually enough food to feed the Fourth Armored Infantry and thermostats are set to "bake." I've gotten in trouble many times for turning house thermostats down below 75 degrees.)

Since I'm an introvert (on a scale of 1 to 100, with 1 being "cave dweller" I score a 25), large gatherings are not my thing in general. So Christmas becomes more of a "have to" than a "want to." As Ellen said in the epic movie, Christmas Vacation, "What can I say, honey? It's the holidays and we're all miserable."

So I thought maybe I could riff on the crass commercialization of Christmas. Just as sure as the annual freak out over The Roads is the annual menacing news stories about Christmas Sales. If they aren't high enough, the whole economy goes into the shitter. So get out there and buy, buy, buy!

But before we Christians get all outraged about consumerism co-oping our holiday, we should remember that we co-oped Christmas first. Christmas wasn't celebrated for centuries until the Christians became jealous of a pagan party thrown every Dec. 25. So we co-oped it as the day to celebrate the birth of Christ. Nobody knows what day is Jesus' real birthday. December 25 is just a day picked out to celebrate it -- and buy tons of stuff.

Nowadays, I suspect even Christians would say the real excitement about Christmas is giving and receiving stuff and gathering together, sometimes for the only time during the year. Even among Christians, if you pumped them full of truth serum, Christ sits at the kids' table while the grown-ups visit.

Jesus being Jesus, I'm sure he understands what's going on here. He's been here before. People treating him like a First Aid kit -- something they only pull out in case of emergencies. Along with December 25's pagan roots, the Bible doesn't make that big of a deal out of Jesus' birth. Two of the four gospels don't even give the story.

Easter, on the other hand, is undisputed The Big Holiday for Christians. Christians believe that Easter marks the crucifixion and resurrection of Christ, which is the central event in all of Christianity. If the Easter story is false, then the whole of Christianity falls. You could argue that without Jesus being born, he wouldn't have ever been crucified and resurrected and I'd give you that, but you'd still have to give me the overriding importance of Easter.

So I asked a very wise minister once why Christmas shoves Easter out of the spotlight. Besides the whole receiving free stuff angle, he said that it's "easier for people to adore a child than to follow a man." Well, amen. Christ as a babe puts no expectations on anyone except to say how cute he is. Christ as a man, well, he shows up with all kinds of expectations. A main act in Christmas is the miracle of birth. A main part of Easter is violent death. So you can see that Easter also has a big PR problem.

All this was going through my head as I sat at the Alton Reformed Church in Alton, Iowa on December 24 and listened to the Rev. Elizabeth Hardeman representing. Herself quite pregnant, she channeled the story line of How the Grinch Stole Christmas and talked about how Christmas would still be Christmas even if you took away all the stuff -- the decorations, gatherings, gifts, cookies, etc. etc. etc. I wonder. Don't you wish that we could live through a Grinch-like plot twist where we wake up and all the Christmas stuff was gone? Would we react like the Whos down in Whoville and celebrate anyway?

Not likely. We'd launch Congressional investigations and have to deal with children so distraught they required medication.

Still, Rev. Hardeman's message was a good one to hear on the eve of the Great Gift Opening Frenzy. Since I believe that God got me fired and flung me out on my own in July, Christmas 2007 has taken on a whole new patina. First of all, without any guaranteed income at all, spending money on gifts freaks me out way more this year. But mainly I'm more expectant this year. As Rev. Hardeman said, I expect the unexpected with Christ. He shows up at strange times and in strange places (Nazareth) and works through strange people (a nobody carpenter and a nobody teenage girl). The Bible is filled with stories of God working through the little people. He almost always selects nobodies to work his will.

So, it came to me that my Christmas gift is an even greater sense of expectation and being open to whatever God hurls at me. If you're a type A person, it's hugely difficult to open yourself to the seeming randomness of Christianity. We're called to surrender control of our lives and follow another's lead. Extremely difficult for Type As. Fortunately I'm not a Type A. I've always been fine with the concept that some things you cannot know and some things you cannot anticipate and plan for.

So I sit here in my underground lair at 6:16 a.m. on December 27 waiting to see what God hurls at me next. He's already brought me a few small pleasant surprises in the last few weeks. Christmas presents. We'll see what continues to unwrap in 2008.

I hope you all had a great Christmas full of whatever you wanted it to be full of, and all your wishes come true for 2008. And God bless us all, every one.

Comments

[My Name Is IRL]

Not to take away from the theme of the post, but...I had to look up "patina", so thanks for the gift of increased vocabulary.

[Bill]

My gift to you, Jeffy, given in response to your gift to me, which is reading this post.

[Jim from Out in the Sticks]

I also do not want to take away from the theme of the post, as I have similar feelings each year: I know what Christmas is all about, but how did the rest of this crap (buying stuff) get so overwhelming. I'm writing about the Pressdog column, which you already apologized for getting your lists mixed up. You should put a "Buy Bill a Beer" button on your Blog page as well! (I'll send you one via Visa, homey don't play Pay-Pal!)

[starla]

Loved that, Bill!! Thanks for sharing your thoughts...you quiet people have so much to say nonverbally.