Finding Balance in an Unbalanced Culture
Dr. Bill Hoyt
Regional Consultant
bill@hoythome.net
December 2011
Andy Rooney is dead. Usually, whenever I watched 60 Minutes, I found myself enduring 55 minutes to get to Andy Rooney. Sometimes, I recorded 60 Minutes and only watched Rooney. In my mind he was old all his life and now he is gone. Even if I could, I have no desire to take his place as America’s most beloved curmudgeon. For one thing, I don’t have the eyebrows for it! But there are times when I feel compelled to emulate him and do my curmudgeonly best. This is one those times.
So what has made me want to hunch over a desk, look into an imaginary camera and mutter, “Can you remember when…?” What has pushed me over the edge? Black Friday! And Cyber Monday. I mean, can you remember the good old days when Christmas decorations never appeared in stores until after Thanksgiving, ‘Black Friday’ was a movie starring Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi and ‘Cyber’ was a Marvel comic book supervillan? OK, OK, I admit it; I am almost as old as Andy Rooney too.
The Consumer Mentality Run Amuck
On one day alone, the Monday before “Black Friday” I received 40 emails promoting Black Friday bargains. In addition to the expected department, electronic, clothing and toy stores I received Black Friday email advertisements from Godiva Chocolates, Barnes and Noble, Samsung, United Airlines, Hewlett Packard, Amazon, Staples, Costco, Tivo, Visa, ShareBuilder, Apple, San Disk and no less than eight software companies! Now integrity demands that I confess I was not scandalized by the Godiva Chocolates email. A purveyor of really quality chocolate can email me as often as they like, under any pretense and I will not be offended and I might successfully be enticed to rush out and buy some.
“Black Friday” is nothing more than a creation of some marketing genius who succeeded in fabricating a day of the year on which people can be induced to spend money they don’t have on things they don’t need – all in the name of Christmas. Spraying a couple dozen people with Mace and then calmly paying for the X-box she came for, shootings at Wal-Marts and stores needing to put up steel barricades at their doors to keep people from smashing them down in a stampede to find a bargain – what does any of that have to do with Christmas?
And then, two days before “Black Friday,” I started receiving “Cyber Monday” emails! Don’t spend all your money on “Black Friday,” save some for “Cyber Monday.” Oh, don’t worry. You spent all your money on Friday, no problem, we take credit cards. No crowds. No lines. No driving. No trouble finding a parking spot. Free shipping if you spend enough money.
Christmas has been hijacked by corporate America and as the world’s consummate consumers, we have helped them succeed.
The True Spirit of Christmas
At its core, Christmas is celebrating God’s great gift of His Son and with His Son, salvation. Christmas is about expressing our gratitude to God for His mercy and grace made tangible by the Incarnation.
We express our gratitude in worship. We worship by telling the story of His coming to earth as a human being in word and song. The enduring power of Handel’s Messiah stems not only from the beauty and grandeur of the music itself, but more importantly from the words that help us re-tell the story and celebrate the Gift.
We express our gratitude in witness. One the great joys of Christmas occurs when Christians gather with other Christians and recount the Christmas story to each other. That’s why the faithful and the nominal alike flock to church at Christmas and wouldn’t think of missing a Christmas Eve Candlelight service. What can be more wonderful than gathering with like-minded people and once again re-telling “the old, old story?”
Well, for one thing, telling the story to the unchurched and to those who do not yet believe. The Christmas season often softens the hearts and minds of people who are painfully aware of their failures, short-comings and sins. They enter the Christmas season looking for hope. Does God still love me in spite of what I have done? Can I be forgiven? Can I change and stop doing the things I don’t really want to do and begin, with consistency, to do those things that I know are right and good – the things I want to do?
Christmas gives opportunity to witness to seekers, assuring them that God loves sinful, fallen people (that’s all of us) and He loved us so much He sent is only Son. We have the grand privilege of letting them know, “The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood…” (John 1:14 The Message) “Just another” Christmas becomes unforgettable when we are privileged to see someone discover Jesus as savior and begin walking through life arm-in-arm with Him.
We express our gratitude in giving to others. As a parent and grandparent, I take great delight in giving gifts to my sons, daughters-in-law and grandchildren. I love it when I am able to give them something they appreciate and enjoy. I believe this kind of giving is a legitimate form of Christmas giving. But I also believe Christmas giving is far richer when our giving to family and friends is accompanied by generous giving to God.
And what might “giving to God” look like? Well, it might be giving to “the Lord’s work” in general or to our church in particular. But its best expression might be our giving to Jesus in the way He himself coached us to do.
“Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’
“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
“The King will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’” (Matthew 25:34-40)
According to Jesus, the way we give to Him is to care “for the least of these.” When we care for the sick, feed the hungry, give to the poor, welcome the stranger, or visit the prisoner we are giving to God in the purest form.
Living Christian in an Anti-Christian Culture
Our culture has, by and large embraced “Black Friday,” “Cyber Monday,” and the retailing of Christmas. True Christianity is always counter-culture. Jesus was counter-culture and as his followers maybe the time has come for us to be more counter-culture.
It’s too late this year to counter “Black Friday” or “Cyber Monday.” But we can still urge our people to recalibrate their giving, reminding them what giving to Jesus looks like; caring for the sick, feeding the hungry, giving to the poor, and visiting the prisoners.
And maybe next year, we can plan with our people to find creative ways, not to shop on “Black Friday” and “Cyber Monday,” but instead to focus on giving to Jesus by caring for “the least of these”, His brothers, sisters and children.