The miracles of Santa?
Mike and I have been talking about what traditions we want to do for Christmas as a family, and the subject of Santa inevitably comes up every time. The thing is.. Santa was a tradition in both of our families growing up, and, of course, it was fun and we both had a great childhood. I don't think believing in Santa did us any harm or was bad in any way. There's just been something nagging at us about it. There are several reasons we have come up with as to why we maybe don't want to continue this tradition, but I believe the real reason for this unsettling feeling about santa claus is so simple--there's not enough time for that story.
Isn't the birth of our Lord and Savior, the King of Kings, the Lord Immanuel more than we are even capable of celebrating? Isn't the miracle of His birth so much bigger than the miracles of Santa and the good deeds of St. Nicholas? Why do we get so excited about Santa Claus coming to town on the day that Jesus came to town when they don't even compare? I just don't want to have time for the Santa story. Lord, help me marvel at Your Gift to us so fully that there's no room for Santa.
I don't want to be able to go a day this holiday season without being COMPLETELY overtaken by the fact that God loves us so much that he sent His son to save us, to save ME, and to save YOU. There isn't anything we can add, including Santa, to make the real Christmas story more special or more magical.
I want to spend all my energy showing Joshua the true miracle of Christmas. Once we do capture the fullness of God's Gift to us, we will have fun with the story of Santa. But.. God's love is endless, and so, too are the miracles of Jesus.
Isn't the birth of our Lord and Savior, the King of Kings, the Lord Immanuel more than we are even capable of celebrating? Isn't the miracle of His birth so much bigger than the miracles of Santa and the good deeds of St. Nicholas? Why do we get so excited about Santa Claus coming to town on the day that Jesus came to town when they don't even compare? I just don't want to have time for the Santa story. Lord, help me marvel at Your Gift to us so fully that there's no room for Santa.
I don't want to be able to go a day this holiday season without being COMPLETELY overtaken by the fact that God loves us so much that he sent His son to save us, to save ME, and to save YOU. There isn't anything we can add, including Santa, to make the real Christmas story more special or more magical.
I want to spend all my energy showing Joshua the true miracle of Christmas. Once we do capture the fullness of God's Gift to us, we will have fun with the story of Santa. But.. God's love is endless, and so, too are the miracles of Jesus.
posted by elizabeth at 10:07 PM
4 Comments:
Hi,
I'm not sure I understand. To begin, are you considering not to continue the Santa Clause tradition? Or have you already decided?
Also, are you saying that the birth of Jesus is so big and awesome, that there is no more "space" (for lack of a better word) for another element to Christmas? Or are you saying that there shouldn't be any distractions?
If it's the latter, then perhaps celebrating the day the Three Kings came (in January) or the original Sinter Clause (from Germany) might provide an alternative. Is this truly and either/or choice? Are the two necessarily mutually exclusive?
Either way, Santa Clause is just a big business conspiracy literally drawn up in the 1930s to sell Coca Cola. Ha. (hint of sarcasm).
MERRY CHRISTMAS too !
We've been feeling like we don't want to do the whole Santa thing, but Santa is everywhere and celebrating Santa is sort of "expected" by everyone. So, we were considering ways we could use some sort of Santa-like tradition. For example, we could celebrate Saint Nicholas as a part of Christmas. Or, we could just do three gifts from "santa"/saint nicholas like the wise men brought. We could do Santa, but just REALLY emphasize the Jesus' birth is the most important.... We came up with a few ideas, but the whole idea of celebrating anything in addition to the birth of Jesus continues to leave us uneasy. However, we still have a long time before Joshua even understands any of it.
It's just easy to get carried away with the comercialized part of Christmas and with Santa and not even realize it. I believe that the story of Jesus' birth is so spectacular itself and I don't want that to be minimized in any way. (Further, we already minimize the real Christmas story because we are human, and therefore, our comprehension of Jesus' birth and of God's love is finite.)
Hi Elizabeth - I'm just visiting your blog for the first time and I wanted to tell you what happened with us and "Santa". We always had "Santa" with our first son, and around 4 years old he began to question whether or not Santa was real.
He was, at the same time, beginning to realize that he could tell us an "un-truth" and we wouldn't know, so we were constantly dealing with the lying thing. We told him that mommy and daddy would never lie to him and he shouldn't lie to us either.
One day, out of the blue - he asked me "Is Santa real?" I didn't hesitate, but said "no, it's just pretend for fun". He said he didn't think so either, because why would the poor kids not get much and the rich kids get a lot if there really was a Santa.
So, when our second son came along, we just had fun with the idea of a pretend Santa but never acted like it was real. It turned out not to be a big deal with either of them.
We also never got in the habit of indulging a lot at Christmas. We told them that we would celebrate their birthdays and get them special things, but Christmas is Jesus' birthday, not theirs, so we resist the urge to go too far out at Christmas but we pull out the stops at their own birthdays.
Just some of my thoughts.
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