With Christmastime here, the question often arises: what should we do with our kids and Santa?
What are we teaching children when we tell them the Santa story, the story of a kind and gentle stranger who gives
us gifts? Is this a dangerous myth that will serve to tarnish their trust in adults? Or is there value in the story?
When our kids were little, we thought a lot about whether or not to tell this story, whether to share the deception, and how
we would break the news of the truth eventually. And the more we thought, the more we thought we needed them to
take part in the story, because there is a remarkable lesson tied up in understanding the Santa story.
The lesson in the Santa story is centered around what Santa reveals to us about our relationship with God. At least once a
year it is important to recognize that sometimes we get some things we clearly don’t deserve, things that are meant just for us,
things that just come from Love.
We don’t get gifts at Christmas because we deserve them, even though we might tell children that Santa or the elf on the shelf is always watching;
no, we get gifts at Christmas solely and explicitly because we are loved, but not with mushy-gushy, smootchy-face romantic love, but rather with self-denying, outwardly-focused, parent-to-child love. In the Greek this is called agape; it is this love that is shown in Scripture; it is this love that is the fundament of the ideals of charity.
Our pop culture tries to trick us into thinking that love is only eros, but the heart of Love is agape.
In Christmas we discover that we are loved infinitely in a remarkably personal, agape-directed way by none other than the Creator of the Universe,
He, who at the genesis of Time, created the sun and the stars,
He who created Day and Night, Land and Sea and Sky,
and He who brought all things into being.
The real Christmas story tells us that this infinite God has given us Men — fallen, sinful, lustful, gluttonous, greedy, slovenly, wrathful, envious, and proud Men that we are — He has given us a gift at Christmas of infinite value: a son who opened for us the path to eternal salvation.
And we don’t deserve it. But we still get it, because we are loved, for God is love.
Santa brings gifts to us for no other reason than that we are loved. That is what Love does. And that’s the message that we need to share, the message we need to speak, the message we need to remember. And that’s why it’s important to understand the story of Santa, because that story of Santa helps tell us a little bit about our relationship to God.
- Written by our son Rafe who delivered it as a prayer at his company’s Christmas Luncheon. Thank you Rafe, and thank you God, for giving us Rafe. Rafe asks us to share this message with our friends and the families we know and love.