I remember believing in Santa. It was the most thrilling and somewhat scary thought that he knew everything I said and did and would soon be coming down our chimney with presents. I never wanted to sit on the mall Santa’s lap. It was obvious the real Santa was too busy to visit malls, though I so appreciated he found the time to do his television special with KAKE-man and later, ToyBoy, each year. When the real Santa is in his workshop on TV, it becomes crystal clear all the store Santas are imposters.
I’ll never forget when I was 9 yrs old, a friend of mine dragged me into the bathroom of her house to tell me Santa wasn’t real. I remember my heart beating rapidly, my hands feeling clammy, and my stomach feeling sick. I’ve never truly gotten over it. I guess that’s why I love the Ghost of Christmas Present so much in Dicken’s A Christmas Carol. He’s completely the epitome of Santa and he’s not a physical being, so wherever there’s a spirit of love, joy, laughter, and Christmas, I think of him!
This brings me to the inspiration of Santa, the basis of The Ghost of Christmas Present, and everything that relates to joy, hope, love, and redemption. “For God so loved the world He sent His only son…” “and they wrapped Him in swaddling cloths and laid Him in a manger.”
How ridiculous. The whole world filled with complications, regrets, tragedies, selfishness, and utter despair, hangs its hope on a helpless infant sleeping where the horses and cows fed? Outrageous. Preposterous. It’s simply not sophisticated enough. Where’s the complexity? A baby? No riches? No manipulations? No power?
And this all leads to His death on a cross, misunderstood, rejected, overlooked…wait a minute, isn’t that the human condition?
God came and felt His own abandonment, completely ignored by the masses. His mission was to be the Savior of all, whether or not anyone noticed. This is incredibly anti-human…which is one significant reason why I still believe, though the only proof I have is the mysterious bread crumbs I have collected along the path that I’ve been following in search of this loving God who inspired Dickens to write his brilliant story of redemption and St Nicholas to give all that he had to those in need. “For behold I bring you good tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. Unto you is born this day a Savior, ‘tis Christ the Lord.”
“He grew up before him like a tender shoot, and like a root out of dry ground. He had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. He was despised and rejected by mankind, a man of suffering, and familiar with pain. Like one from whom people hide their faces he was despised, and we held him in low esteem. Surely he took up our pain and bore our suffering, yet we considered him punished by God, stricken by him, and afflicted. But he was pierced for our transgressions, he was crushed for our iniquities; the punishment that brought us peace was on him, and by his wounds we are healed. We all, like sheep, have gone astray, each of us has turned to our own way; and the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all.”
Isaiah 53:2-6
Seasons of the Soul 