Advice From God

Hi. I’m Jesus.

My dad said that I could use his blog to make a comment on something that has been bothering me for a long time now. It’s the Christmas carol Do You Hear What I Hear?.

Specifically, what hurts my feelings is the verse that goes A child, a child, shivering in the cold, let us bring him silver and gold.

People, why did they want to bring me silver and gold? I was cold! I didn’t ask for money. Didn’t they know that metals conduct heat?

My feelings were hurt long ago. Why are people singing to bring this trauma back to the surface?

Dear God,

Last weekend, I attended a performance of the Nutcracker ballet with my children. I thought You would surely be O.K. with that, since it’s a Christmas ballet, and Christmas has everything to do with Jesus’s birthday and nothing at all to do with a midwinter pagan festival of lights.

But as I was watching the Nutcracker, I started to wonder what, if anything, the plot of the ballet had to do with Jesus. There’s this weird uncle in a cape who gives a nutcracker to a little girl. Then at night the Christmas tree grows up through the roof, the nutcracker comes alive and fights with mice, then the toys all come alive and dance around, and snowflakes in little white tutus prance all over the place, and there are some not at all wholesome intimations of a young girl’s romance with a cylindrical wooden object. Is Jesus there in any of this? Did I miss Him?

I know that some children’s magic stories, like The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, are good. Some, like Harry Potter, will land you straight in Hell if you so much as brush your hand across the dust jacket. But what about Christmas magic?

Then it occurred to me that some of the carols we sing around this time of year don’t have Jesus in them either. Should I be singing Frosty the Snowman with my kids? It’s about this magic hat that makes a snowman come alive and disobey a direct order from a peace officer. It sounds kind of like a medieval alchemist creating a golem or something, which is about as blasphemous as you can get. But then again, Frosty comes back again after he melts away, so he might be a symbol for Jesus.

I’m confused, God. Please set me back on the straight and narrow.

-Barry

Barry,

It’s a good thing you figured this out when you did. About half of the carols people who call themselves good Christians traipse around singing this time of year will win you an eternal dream date with the Prince of Darkness.

Frosty and the Nutcracker are good examples.

Jingle Bells is right out. Oh what fun it is to ride in a one horse open sleigh and ignore Jesus tonight. Oh what less fun it is to endure an eternity of wailing and gnashing of teeth.
And that song about the holly and the ivy? Pagan and Christian symbols joined together in cheerful holiday harmony. Very politically correct, which is bad.

Deck the Halls. Go ahead and sing it. Then you’ll have eternity to tell all your friends in Hell how you just didn’t realize that there’s nothing Biblical about boughs of holly.
I’m not too hot about that wassail song, but it eventually gets around to asking Me to bless you send you a happy New Year.

I let What Child is This slide, despite the pagan tune, because it’s all about Jesus. As a rule of thumb, if it focuses primarily on Jesus, God or angels, you’re on safe ground. Godless winter merrymaking or pagan symbolism will get you in hot water.

-God

Dear God,

I’m confused about what to say to people this holiday (Christmas? sorry!) season. I want to include all my friends who practice Kwanzaa or Hanukkah. After all, there are a lot of holidays this time of year. I don’t want to offend anybody by just assuming everybody’s Christian. Then again, I’m a Christian and I’m proud of it, so sometimes I just want to say “Merry Christmas.” Should I say “Season’s Greetings,” “Happy Holidays,” or “Merry Christmas?”

-Lillian

Lillian,

The proper greeting is “Happy Jesus’s Birthday,” or “Merry Christmas.” Don’t settle for cheap imitations.

There are two kinds of people in the world: people who celebrate Christmas and people who would if they knew what was good for them. Whoever you’re talking to, it’s one or the other. The best way to include your friends who practice Kwanzaa or Hanukkah is to convert them to Christianity. Then you can include them when you go to heaven, too.

Jesus is the reason for the season. Now, I know what you’re thinking: some Copernican claptrap the secular humanists fed you in public school about the angle of the earth’s axis relative to the plane in which it rotates around the sun having something to do with the reason for the season. Well, that’s not in the Bible, so it’s not true.

And what is all this politically correct pablum about not offending people? I sent my own son to live among you that you might have an example to follow in leading your lives. And boy, did he have a knack for offending people. Go forth, follow in the footsteps of the Savior and start ticking people off. The next time someone at one of those massive retail stores wishes you “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas,” just look them square in the face and say,

“Do I look like I celebrate Hanukkah or something? That’s Merry Christmas, if you don’t mind!”

Then just let them have it about how the corporate elite of their massive retail chain is nothing more than a global network of moneylenders just like those Jesus drove from the temple. Tell them that the way they destroy small town family businesses, shop around for cheap sweatshop goods made by exploited foreign labor, screw over their employees, harass unions, and poison the environment is a betrayal of every value Jesus taught the world in the name of His Father. Actually, never mind. I don’t really care about all that stuff.

But boy it chaps my ass when someone says “Happy Holidays!”

-God

Dear God,

I’m confused about what to say to people this holiday (Christmas? sorry!) season. I want to include all my friends who practice Kwanzaa or Hanukkah. After all, there are a lot of holidays this time of year. I don’t want to offend anybody by just assuming everybody’s Christian. Then again, I’m a Christian and I’m proud of it, so sometimes I just want to say “Merry Christmas.” Should I say “Season’s Greetings,” “Happy Holidays,” or “Merry Christmas?”

-Lillian

Lillian,

The proper greeting is “Happy Jesus’s Birthday,” or “Merry Christmas.” Don’t settle for cheap imitations.

There are two kinds of people in the world: people who celebrate Christmas and people who would if they knew what was good for them. Whoever you’re talking to, it’s one or the other. The best way to include your friends who practice Kwanzaa or Hanukkah is to convert them to Christianity. Then you can include them when you go to heaven, too.

Jesus is the reason for the season. Now, I know what you’re thinking: some Copernican claptrap the secular humanists fed you in public school about the angle of the earth’s axis relative to the plane in which it rotates around the sun having something to do with the reason for the season. Well, that’s not in the Bible, so it’s not true.

And what is all this politically correct pablum about not offending people? I sent my own son to live among you that you might have an example to follow in leading your lives. And boy, did he have a knack for offending people. Go forth, follow in the footsteps of the Savior and start ticking people off. The next time someone at one of those massive retail stores wishes you “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas,” just look them square in the face and say,

“Do I look like I celebrate Hanukkah or something? That’s Merry Christmas, if you don’t mind!”

Then just let them have it about how the corporate elite of their massive retail chain is nothing more than a global network of moneylenders just like those Jesus drove from the temple. Tell them that the way they destroy small town family businesses, shop around for cheap sweatshop goods made by exploited foreign labor, screw over their employees, harass unions, and poison the environment is a betrayal of every value Jesus taught the world in the name of His Father… Actually, never mind. I don’t really care about all that stuff.

But boy it chaps my ass when someone says “Happy Holidays!”

- God

Dear God,

What does Santa Claus have to do with Christmas? I mean, they say that Christmas is about celebrating the birth of Jesus. So, then, what does some big old guy in a red suit from the North Pole flying through the air in the middle of the night have to do with with Jesus, who never went to the North Pole?

- Ferdinando

Ferdinando,

You’re making a lot of assumptions, both about Jesus and about Santa Claus.

First of all, do you know for a fact that Jesus never went to the North Pole? No, you don’t. Well, just consider this: Why do you think Jesus had a big long beard? That’s right – to protect his face from frostbite. It just so happens that the lost years of Jesus were spent not in India, as some have supposed, but at the North Pole, teaching reindeer how to fly.

Now, about Santa Claus. Well, see, what you probably don’t realize is that Santa Claus is Jesus, and Jesus is Santa Claus. People have been waiting for the second coming of Jesus for centuries, not realizing that he is already here. Jesus came back as Santa Claus. Both of them have big beards, right? Well, sure, Santa’s beard is white, but that’s because he’s even more pure now than he was before. It’s kind of like how Gandalf was reincarnated as a white wizard instead of a grey wizard. So, if Gandalf can do it, would you say that Jesus can’t?

Think about it now. Have you ever bothered to look at Santa’s hands? I’ll bet you haven’t. Well, the next time you see Santa, ask to look at his hands. You’ll see he still has the scars.

- God