Anxious for Christmas

It was November 15. I was driving in town, slowed down to make a right turn and saw a pickup truck parked in a driveway. In the bed of the truck there was a Christmas tree. My first thought was, here is a family anxious for Christmas.

I know some people grumble about stores selling ornaments and cards too early, lights on houses and trees decorated in November. To some it seems wrong. They say, we used to wait until after Thanksgiving, but no more. We can’t wait.

The children can’t wait because they know there will be presents. I remember how anxious I was. Even though there would not be many gifts, I knew there would be something special for me under the tree. I still have the cap gun with the white belt and holster and the bow with the quiver for the arrows. I remember the extended family gatherings in our small home for the traditional Norwegian meal of lutefisk and boiled potatoes with lots of melted butter. I certainly remember the women saying, “We will not open any presents until we eat our dinner and the dishes are all put away.” For sure we children were anxious, saying, “Hurry up! Hurry up!”

But it is more than receiving gifts. We are anxious for Christmas because we like what it does to us. We give to others, write letters, gather with family and friends. We put money in a kettle to help people we don’t know. We greet each other and we make sure that those who are struggling to make ends meet have food on the table and toys for the kids. We even go to church in the middle of the week. We visit people in nursing homes. We who can’t sing, sing anyway. All because it is Christmas.

No, it’s never too early for Christmas.

Once again we reach out our arms to hold this baby near our hearts. We smile and relax just a bit, filled with the wonder of this life, so pure, so gentle. This child cannot help but change us for the better.

On that first Christmas night, the angel said to the shepherds, “Do not be afraid” (Luke 2:10). What is there to fear from a baby? A baby is powerless, with no guile, no anger, and no judgment, only needing from us without fearing we will not provide: simply trusting and content to be resting in our arms. This is how God came. This is Christmas. This one child. And for a time, perhaps too brief, our fears are taken over by our love for this child and he is able to change our hearts.

“This will be a sign for you,” the angel said to the shepherds, “you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger” (v. 12). At each Christmas we too find our way to this baby and are glad. The apostle Paul wrote to the congregation in the town of Colossae, “Jesus is the image of the invisible God . . . For in him the fullness of God was pleased to dwell” (Colossians 1:15, 19).

We will light the lights, decorate the tree, buy the gifts, send the cards, gather with family, and greet one another. All good, but we know deep within ourselves that all of it is only the wrapping. We know that the gift is the baby, this one particular child named Jesus. “You are to name him Jesus,” said the angel to Joseph, for he will save his people from their sins” (Matthew 1:21).

In Jesus, we are free to live life as fully and as joyfully as we will allow ourselves. For it is only we who hold ourselves back. God does not. For God has forgiven us in this baby and will not restrain us from living with sheer abandon, trusting in this gentle and gracious God, who keeps telling us, “Do not be afraid.”

When Christmas comes each year, we catch a glimpse of who we are meant to be in our giving, in our joy, and in our care for those with little power in this world.

We are better people at Christmas.

Of course we are anxious for Christmas.

Gary