thoughts about santa...

This was taken from the book Treasuring Christ in Your Traditions by Noel Piper, which I previously mentioned I read last month.  It was excellent, to say the least.  She included a lot of thought-provoking insight to family traditions, the most insightful being Christmas.  J and I have already thought about this issue, but she lays it out so clearly, I thought I might share it here as well.  She has also been posting segments about Advent on her blog [some of which I have already shared here] and this one was posted today...so read and ponder...weigh and question...come to your own conclusions, but remember that in all things Christ should be glorified above all else.  Let me know if you have any thoughts regarding these things!!

"I’m not on a campaign, but I thought some of you might be interested in the way we think about one of the very visible “symbols” of the season.

For several reasons, we chose not to include Santa Claus in our Christmas stories and decorations.

First, fairy tales are fun, but we didn’t ask our children to believe them. On the contrary, they’re a good way to learn the difference between real-life and make believe. Second, celebrating with Santa and manger will postpone a child’s clear understanding of what the real truth of God is.

It’s very difficult for a young child to pick through a marble cake of part-truth and part-imagination to find the crumbs of reality. We wanted our children to understand God as fully as they were able, at whatever age they were. So we tried to avoid things that would inhibit or distort that understanding.

Third, think how confusing it must be to a straight-thinking, uncritical preschooler. Santa is so much like what we’re trying all year to teach our children about God. Look at the “attributes” of Santa.

• He’s omniscient—he sees everything you do.
• He rewards you if you’re good.
• He’s omnipresent—at least, he can be everywhere in one night.
• He gives you good gifts.
• He’s the most famous “old man in the sky” figure.

But at the deeper level that young children haven’t reached yet, he is not like God at all.

For example, does Santa really care if we’re bad or good? Think of the most awful kid you can remember. Did he or she ever not get gifts from Santa? What about Santa’s spying and then rewarding you if you’re good enough?

That’s not the way God operates. He gave us his gift—his Son—even though we weren’t good at all. “God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us” (Romans 5:8). He gave his gift to us to make us good, not because we had proved ourselves good enough."