How Christmas can break your heart

A hard story to hear. Please don't look away.

Christmas often makes me sad.

There, I said it out loud. If I’m really honest, it can even make me mad.

I know that officially makes me “that guy.” As in, “Who invited that guy?”

So be it. Don’t invite me back to dinner, but I hope you’ll at least listen to my reasons while we’re here.

I didn’t always feel this way. Far from it! I grew up on “A Charlie Brown Christmas” and “Frosty the Snowman.” I loved the lights, the decorations, the tree, the music, the food — all of it. I also grew up going to church, so I could recite the “reason for the season” as well as anyone.

But it was the spectacle — and the presents — that kept me enthralled, just like everyone else. When I became a parent, I was excited to pass all of that along to my kids.

Then the spell started to fray.

First, I experienced the toxic pressure to provide all those glittery things — that keep the glamour of Christmas in full force — at a time of real financial uncertainty in my life. Satan is a master accuser, but it really doesn’t take much skill to convince a young father he’s a failure if he can’t fill the gaping space under his own tree to make it look like those in TV commercials.

But what really rubbed the shiny paint off occurred the year when my son, Paul, was six.

That Christmas, some toy had caught his eye, and he simply had to have it. We didn’t watch much television in our house, so I’m not sure how he even knew this thing existed. He absorbed it out of the atmosphere, I guess.

By the time you become a parent, chances are you’ve got a pretty good sense of what things are likely to be a disappointment. But it was certain he’d be disappointed if that toy wasn’t there on Christmas. So we bought it.

On the morning, he ripped the paper away and his face came alive with joy. Real joy. His dream came true! His happiness was complete.

For about a day and a half. Being plastic and made to sell, not to use, it broke.

My son brought it to me, heartbroken. He wanted me to “fix it,” which is nearly always impossible with such things.

It fell to me to explain to him “the way things are.” I dutifully told him disappointment is “just a part of life.”

To this day I feel the weight of the expression on his face as he took it all in. Disappointment is one thing, but what I saw in his eyes was betrayal. My betrayal.

What defense could I offer? What would he understand about the evil at work in people who get rich marketing garbage to children? How could I explain that without implicating myself as a participant? No amount of deflection would save me.

So, on Jesus’ birthday I taught my son that the world is cruel and full of empty promises. On our Savior’s birthday I played my part in initiating my children into how things are done in Satan’s brutal kingdom — all because I was captured by “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer” as a child and couldn’t figure out how to back up.

Facing this was one of the most desolate moments of my life. I’ve rarely felt more stained or more in need of redemption. Because, the truth is, everything this world has to offer — sex, money, fame, power, false security — is exactly like that toy: broken by design before we even pick it up.

In how many other ways have I “passed on” the lie to the people I love by my participation?

Every time we believe and behave in step with this lie, we sin — missing the mark and the truth of how we are meant to live as new creatures in Christ.

I know this story is not the whole truth of how our culture celebrates Christmas, and the good that can be found in it. I know “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:5).

And yet it does no good to pretend that the darkness isn’t trying to overcome it, even on Christmas. Especially on Christmas. It can’t hurt to confess the ways in which we cooperate with that.

The “great light” seen by people walking in darkness (Isaiah 9:2) is meant to overthrow wickedness, not provide a mythologized excuse to celebrate and collaborate with it.

How have we let Christmas, of all things, become something for which we need to repent?

POSTSCRIPT: Five years ago, my son Paul died of an accidental drug overdose. He spent most of his life seemingly unable to be content with where he was and what he had — exactly as the world intends for all of us.

If you have discovered ways to make your celebration of Christmas more Christ-centered, please share them in the comments.