These past few days, Dalene has been busy doing spring cleaning around the house. Yeah, I know we just started winter, but a woman’s sense of needing to give the family nest a makeover is not necessarily regulated by the seasons. It can strike at any time. She finally had enough of the slow build-up of wear-and-tear, clutter and dust bunnies since the last time she went through the house with a white glove, fine-tooth comb and whatever other proverbial tool helps one find dirt and root out all t-shirts with brown-stained armpits. It might have had something to do with our 17 year old Christmas tree that sheds a good amount of its needles every time it is put up or taken down. After our post-Noel cleanup, we were finding little green artificial pine needles everywhere and were getting tired of everything looking like it had a dusting of oregano. Something just had to be done. The deep cleaning started in the kitchen – which was great. Her domain. What should be a hygienic place from which yummy food is brought to the table. It gleamed and glistened more than normal when she was done. I liked it a lot, right up until my first cup of coffee the next morning, when I shuffled in to the kitchen and reached for my favorite mug. I could do this with my eyes closed, which I usually do at that time of the morning. I unexpectedly latched onto a plastic pitcher. That could mean either my coffee cup had been super-sized, or that Dalene was both cleaning AND rearranging.
A quick check of the house confirmed my worst suspicions: sock drawer suspiciously well organized; top drawer of hall cabinet cleared of all paper-clips, guitar picks, half-sticks of gum and miscellaneous screws; and the clincher, all coats, gloves, shoes, and hats had been mysteriously taken and put in a new top secret location. This was bad news for me. One, because I am a member of the male race and I already struggle to find things that are where they have always been, let alone after they have been whisked away to a place heaven knows where. But secondly, because I am a bit like a blind person who needs things to be in familiar places, otherwise I get disoriented and easily lose my way. As I write, the process is continuing. Nothing is safe from being swapped with something else. Sweaters, books, furniture, photos on the wall, even door-handles (well not really, but it wouldn’t surprise me). Little piles destined for the garage appear regularly, unfortunate items deemed unfit for the “new” us. Now the real opinion of a shirt or tie is evidenced by its appearance in the rummage-sale stack.
There is a spiritual analogy to be drawn here. In the same way I like to feel clean and be clean, I love it when Christ comes to my rescue and performs a deep cleansing of my heart and soul. It feels so good to shine again and get the gunk out. But cleaning AND rearranging? I don’t like that so much. As he lays his finger on unattractive attitudes or habits I have been wearing, I find myself a little reluctant to put them on the throw-out pile, even though they might be dingy, moth-eaten and even smell a bit rank. I like things in my life to remain comfortably predictable, just the way I arranged them. I have grown comfortable with the way things are. And so I am adverse to the Holy Spirit rearranging elements in my life, suddenly and without permission, when I am not ready. Relational styles, emotional supports, and coping systems – all are fair game for his tendency toward renovation. But my life is His domain. He has the right. And frankly, there are times when He has just had enough of the clutter and the dirt; something just has to be done. I feel a little disoriented at first. But slowly, I begin to see the wisdom of the new arrangement. And it begins to feel more familiar and not so foreign. This month as we begin extended days of fasting and prayer to begin 2012, I expect my life to go through some cleaning and rearranging – maybe a lot of it. And you know what I’ve found? Both my wife and the Holy Spirit are pretty good at spring cleaning. And it’s OK.
As Christ followers who love to celebrate Christmas, my family and I feel as if we are living between two extremes this Christmas season. At one end of the spectrum lies the no-holds-barred, full-on embracing of all things Christmas-related, sacred and secular all rolled together into one big yule log. Santa makes appearances at church celebrations, Christmas trees adorn the platforms, and Christians in all 50 states who campaign to "Keep the Christ in Christmas", see an antichrist conspiracy in every generic "Happy Holidays" uttered or written.
In contrast, I have heard and read several pastors all but deny the existence of Christmas in an effort to keep out the commercial influence and historically pagan origins or overtones from influencing the faithful. One pastor in particular seemed to think the portrayal of Jesus as a baby in a manger reduced Him to a caricature void of His power. For him, Bethlehem cannot be emphasized without minimizing Golgotha. Funny, yet sadly reactionary. Some evengelical churches will see Christmas come and go with nary a change in decor, song list or sermon theme. As if ignoring Christmas will somehow get it changed to the real date of.... well, there is no definitive date, right? But for some, I get the idea that celebrating the birth of Christ on an arbitrary date in March would just, well,feel better than celebrating it on the arbitrary date of December 25th. The effort to not resemble a Carnegie Hall Christmas ends up looking instead like a Kingdom Hall Xmas - kind of sad and hollow.
There you have it - two camps, each just as saved and sincere as the other. Yet one tries to deny Christmas as truly Christian at all, while the other claims the church to be the real owner and last true guardian of the holiday.
I, for one, feel a bit confused by the debate. I would aim for balance in the middle of the fray. I think the Goods are just going to keep on doing what we have always done, and that is to retain, as well as add, as many meaningful memory making traditions we can pack into one month, and enjoy and celebrate them to the fullest with as many believers and non-believers as we can get to join us. While doing so, we plan to be as careful as always to make Christ the focal point of it all and make the Greatest who ever lived be seen and glorified in every facet of the celebration possible. And yet, every year always requires an effort to not let the spirit of the world, manifested by hurriedness, greed, and materialism, encroach into the spirit of the celebration we hold dear.
Don't get me wrong. Santa gets no air-time at our house, You won't find Father Christmas, Pere Noel or Kris Kringle mixing it up with the angels here. But neither do we demonize the poor fella, his reindeer or even the often slighted "pagan" Christmas tree. In the years of practicing to walk the line between Christmas hymns and Christmas hype. I think we get a bit better at it with every passing gingerbread house decorated. But in the end, my Jesus gets a bit more honor, focus, and attention in December than any other month out of my year. And for that, I am grateful for Christmas, mistletoe and all.
One thing I am coming to appreciate more about French culture is its resistance to becoming consumer driven. At first, it drove me crazy that most stores close at noon for two or even three hours, so that ALL the employees can have a leisurely lunch - at the same time. No concept of staggered lunch hours here, no siree. If you need to run to the corner grocery to get a few staples during your lunch break, you will hear a resounding "no" to the question "Got milk?" It was a bit hard to adjust to the fact that the customer is not always right in France, nor is anyone particularly motivated to please him or her. Money does talk here, but it seems the euro speaks in considerably softer and less demanding tones than does the almighty dollar. The French are trying hard in a competetive international market to hold on to traditional ways of doing things which they consider to be more valuable than simply making more money. In other words, there is more to life than selling out to wealth and status. I kind of like it. Especially because I am seeing how a consumer driven mentality elsewhere is adversely affecting two things I like a lot - sports and church.
I have watched with dismay how the rules of the games I love have changed over the years. I am a sports purist who feels comfortably anchored in tradition, which puts me in opposition to such trends and advancements such as instant replay, college football conference realignments, designated hitters, and the 24 second clock, just to name a few. And most of these changes were for the purpose of attracting and retaining more fans and spectators by speeding up the action and creating more scoring. But my point is, if you are a true fan, you love the game - as is. There is no need to speed up the game or change its rules if you already enjoy every minute of it. The real problem lies in the sport attempting to adapt to consumer-enthusiasts who are not really true fans, but shallow dabblers who lose interest when the rules of the sport do not produce a game to suit their fickle tastes and short attention spans. Ticket and merchandise sales as well as television broadcasting rights are what fuel the evolution of sports. In our consumer-driven sociey, profit trumps purity.
Tim Tebow and his team, the Denver Broncos, are causing an uproar in the NFL because they are playing a style of football that was once played by men who earned little and sacrificed much, just for the privilege to play. And that game was played before non-televised audiences who respected the game and passed on its hallowed, timeless traditions to the next generation. Today, sports has to come in trendy, flashy packaging that produces slick highlights, inspires sound-bites and sells tickets. Yet Tebow is literally turning back the clock; a throw-back to such a distant era that he is today considered cutting edge, if not polarizing. He's standing up for traditional values and being a solid role-model instead of spending his free-time with gangsters, strippers, or drug-dealers. Where have we come as a society when we love athletes more who have DUIs and get arrested for domestic violence than someone who prays publicly and serves the poor on humanitarian trips, as long as they win and give us bragging rights around the water cooler? Yes, as a quarterback Tebow runs better than he throws, which is not typical for his position. But this only flies in the face of a game that has come to be shaped and defined by consumers who speak with their wallets and demand to see a football game that meets its quota of long bombs and exciting catches. If not, they'd rather turn the channel to something more entertaining, like cage fighting or WWF Smackdown.
Sadly, the church is not immune to the influence brought by consumerism. People have become so accustomed to being pleased and pampered as consumers and fans, that they carry this mentality into the house of God. And we see that the church and its function and purpose slowly become shaped by the parishoners rather than the parson. What a mistake. I would like to think that the church could inherit a little backbone from the French where the process is equally important to the product. I think my French friends have it right in that regard. They will not sacrifice quality and longevity of life for the sake of short-term gain. May we as believers and leaders in the greatest enterprise the world has ever known not allow oursleves to be driven by church-shoppers and congregation-hoppers. Change is good, and many times necessary. But change for the sake of pleasing participants who major on using and taking, rather than sacrificing and giving, is joining the ranks of consumer driven supermarkets and super bowl contenders. The King and His kingdom should be served by loyal subjects. And I am a purist in that regard as well.
