Unshackled Moments ~ December 2 ~ The Naughty List

You better watch out 

You better not cry 

Better not pout 

I'm telling you why 

Santa Claus is coming to town.

So begins what has to be a terrifying song for those who have any self awareness combined with a belief in Santa. There's one good reason to outgrow belief. The truth is that the idea of good ol' Saint Nick isn't so great if we really stop and think about it. It that's what Christmas were truly about we'd all be in big trouble wouldn't we? The next verse tells us about that list that Santa has to check twice for some reason. I never knew why. Maybe he does it because he just wants to find someone to put on the good side.

As I write this, I am wearing a T-shirt that reads IF YOU'RE NAUGHTY I WON'T TELL SANTA. I'm no snitch, but really, who are we kidding? Unless you lower the standard of good to much lower than the perfect standard of holiness there's no one good, no not one. Not on our own anyway. Even grading on a serious bell curve won't help. That's what's so depressing about the idea behind Santa. The Santa story expresses what we all know to be true, that we should be good. But nothing in the song or in any of the Santa stories tells us how to manage that. We can't do it.

So the time of year when Santa is coming would be about as much to look forward to as the Boogeyman being on his way, if it were true. Here comes yet another person to point out where we don't and can't measure up, if we're honest. Be good for goodness sake. But we can't. Not if good is to be perfectly loving and caring and kind and.......We just hope that we might be a little more good than we are bad, as though being 51% good is enough. And if we try to say it is, let's get a second opinion from one out of the many that each of us has damaged or hurt in some way while living during the 49% not good time.

But thankfully we're not eagerly awaiting the coming of Santa but Jesus. Jesus didn't say be good for goodness sake. Jesus said be perfect, even as God the Father is perfect. He said you have to be good, and realize that good is pure holiness, because anything less isn't really good. But He didn't say do that or get a lump of coal, achieve perfection or wish you had when the consequences arrive. Instead He said this is the standard, but since we can't do it, He'll pay off our shortcomings with His very life. Then comes the Spirit to give us the grace and the power to do what we can never do on our own, walk righteously.

We can look forward to the coming of the King, because it's not about a list of who's been good or bad but who is His. He gives us the power to belong to God as one of His children and to walk in goodness. He doesn't set the standard and leave us on our own to reach it or maintain it. That's wonderful news, since none of us can. We can rejoice in hope this Christmas and every day because the great gift of grace promised and fulfilled in the birth of Christ sets us free from the weight of the Naughty List. O Come O Come Emanuel and set us free.

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