TO the LORD SING PRAISES
Santa Claus was very much a part of Christmas during my childhood. I know that a lot of Christian parents have an issue with Santa Claus, not least because they feel like they are lying to their children about a person who doesn’t exist. Many feel that this undermines a child’s trust in the word of adults. However, in my own experience, I had no issues whatsoever with the discovery that Santa Claus was not real and that the fondly remembered rituals of Christmas Eve, including setting out a plate of cookies and a cup of hot chocolate, were done for our benefit simply because we were children and that was our family tradition.
Whether you agree or disagree with including Santa Claus as part of your Christmas celebration, he is a character who is firmly ensconced in the traditions of Christmas in our culture. The path from his perceived origins to modern day depictions of him is quite circuitous and travels through many European countries before finally coalescing into the Santa Claus we know today. With so many immigrants bringing their own traditions with them to America, we shouldn’t be surprised that our modern view of Santa Claus is a conglomeration of many different ideas about this individual who bears gifts during the Christmas season. The long, white beard and a ride through the night sky seems to have come from Norse mythology and the god, Odin. Dutch folklore contributed the red cape, a book containing names of good and naughty children, and gifts being dropped down chimneys. Father Christmas, primarily from England, was seen as the emblem of good cheer, good food, good wine, and joy. And a simple, anonymous poem published in New York on December 23, 1823 helped to cement the image of Santa Claus that most people have today. A Visit from St. Nicholas, better known as, “The Night Before Christmas,” gave us the image of Santa Claus as a plump and jolly elf (of the shorter variety), and America was first introduced to his primary mode of transportation—eight tiny reindeer pulling a sleigh. Later renditions of Santa Claus would transform him from a small elf into an immortal adult male who was still plump, had rosy cheeks and nose, wore a red outfit, and a now iconic hat, thanks to Haddon Sundblom who drew Santa Claus for Coca-Cola ads in the 1930s.
He has gone through a whole lot of transformations, but one of his main traits has remained with him. Almost every author, artist, musician, playwright, and script writer from the late 19th century on has depicted Santa Claus as being full of merriment and joy. Some exceptions exist (and I’m not talking about those sick and wrong horror movies that turn Santa Claus into some sort of holiday demon), but by and large, we all think of Santa Claus as being one happy dude, the embodiment of Christmas cheer.
Sadly, that is not something that most people say about the LORD nor about many of those who serve Him. The polar opposite (every pun intended) is usually true concerning those who call themselves Christians, and many people even debate over the idea of Jesus being happy. A Google search led me to the following quotes by Adam Lee, an atheist who created a blog called Daylight Atheism in order to “encourage atheists to step out of their closets, into the daylight...”:
“If Jesus was the epitome of mental health, experiencing all the natural and
appropriate emotions that are ours, then I have a question: Where in the
Bible does he laugh?”
“There’s no shortage of wrath in the New Testament, no lack of righteousness
or judgment or even sorrow. But is there even a single instance of laughter –
of genuine, spontaneous mirth, the kind that every child experiences?”
“Not only does Jesus never laugh, it seems, but he condemns those who do,
claiming that sorrow and misery will be theirs in the hereafter. And it’s not
just the New Testament, but the Bible in general that continues this theme.”
“But the Bible, like most religious dogmatists, treats laughter as an unworthy
subject. It’s not difficult to see why: in the cramped and rigidly proscribed
world of fundamentalism, there is no room for irony, no room for taking
either their own doctrines or the beliefs of others with any sort of light-
heartedness. To laugh at something is to admit the existence of more than
one way to view it, and that thought is anathema to the religious worldview
that sees only in black and white.”
And, as upsetting as that point of view is on many levels, I think the following answer given to a question about whether or not Jesus ever laughed, written by a person who claims to be a Christian, is even more disheartening, discouraging, and downright depressing:
“Yet, He is also called the ‘Man of Sorrows’ and the Bible does say ‘Jesus wept’ [sic]”
“I think Jesus was very serious about His mission on earth - Matthew 1:21 our
salvation and this mission involved even his emotions, laughter would not at
least usually be appropriate to this as our SIN left us in a sad state.”
“Imagine a surgeon performing surgery upon which his patient's life depended,
you would not want him laughing and joking while doing it!”
“Now the Bible does not say Jesus never laughed but it shows Him quite serious
about the task of our salvation.”
“Ecclesiates 3:4 says ‘there is a time to weep and a time to laugh’ [sic] An appropriate time ... I imagine we wil [sic] enjoy Jesus' laugh in Heaven!”
Wow. If the person who wrote that response was in earnest, then it really is no wonder that people like Adam Lee feel justified in seeing God and Christianity as mirthless, joyless, and completely void of laughter.
If you take a look at most artists’ renditions of Jesus, you’ll generally see one of two things—agony or vapid serenity. What you almost never see is Jesus laughing or even smiling, for that matter. I did find a few images of Jesus laughing, but to be honest, I thought they were mildly disturbing. The laughter depicted wasn’t joyous mirth, it seemed forced at best. Like so many depictions of Jesus, many believers think of Christianity as a very serious business where life is merely surviving in an ugly world until they die or Jesus returns.
Some look to James 4:9 and argue that God desires for His children not only to be very serious but also downright unhappy. People throughout the centuries have read that verse and come to the conclusion that drawing near to God and humbling ourselves before Him always means making ourselves wretched, always mourning, always weeping, and always being full of sorrow. They read other words written by Paul, such as Romans 8:13, Galatians 5:24, and Colossians 3:5 and believe that in order to please God, we have to lead heavyhearted, cheerless, dull lives. At some point in the Christian lexicon, self-control began to equal deprivation and sacrifice began to equal abject misery, and low self-esteem has come to be the only definition of humility that some people seem to acknowledge. But is that truly how we were meant to live? Is that what the LORD intended when He set His glorious redemption in motion by calling Abram?
You don’t have to be a biblical scholar to know that the answer to those questions is an emphatic NO. You don’t even have to do a very in-depth search in the Bible to see that the LORD is not a God who makes every attempt to squash happiness in His family. I mentioned the blog by Adam Lee earlier, and he contends that there is no shortage of wrath and sorrow in the New Testament. After performing what I confess was a rather surface word search, I found that two of the Greek words used for wrath and sorrow (and admittedly, I didn’t look for all forms of the words) appear 36 times (wrath) and 16 times (sorrow) in the New Testament. Throw at least one form of the word “suffering” in there, and you still add only 16 occurrences of what most people think of as negative ideas. By comparison, the verb form of the Greek word translated as “rejoice” appears 77 times, and the noun form of the same word appears 59 times. If you really want to balance it out that way, God talks a whole lot more about joy and rejoicing and being happy than He does about sorrow and wrath and suffering. And no, the Bible doesn’t mention Jesus laughing even once, which seems to be a huge point of contention with Mr. Lee and other atheists. However, I would question the premise that laughter proves good mental health. Seriously consider what it is that usually causes us to laugh. When our hearts are full of love and contentment and well-being, do we break out in spontaneous laughter? Not usually. Laughter is really not usually the first action of happiness. What do we often find funny? Sarcasm, biting wit, cynicism, and yes, even mockery...those often cause us to laugh, but are those reflections of the character and nature of God? Please don’t misunderstand and think that I am down on laughing. Sometimes laughter can be very good and very healthy. But I find it interesting that the only verse in the Bible which speaks of laughter in a positive way is Luke 6:21. Every other occurrence of laughing and laughter that I could find dealt with mockery or the LORD laughing at the wicked.
The very first use of the word “happy” in the Old Testament comes in Genesis 30:13, and it is the only verse in the entire Bible which uses that particular form of the word. This was at the time when the sons of Jacob were still being born, and Leah was locked in a mighty battle with her sister, Rachel, for Jacob’s affection. She gave her maid, Zilpah, to Jacob as a wife, and Zilpah bore two sons. Leah named the second son of Zilpah, Asher, and declared that she was happy (Asher means “happy”) for the daughters would call her happy. I absolutely love the prophetic blessings given to Asher and the tribe of Asher by Jacob and Moses respectively (Genesis 49:20; Deuteronomy 33:24-25). His bread shall be fat (more literal translation) and he shall yield royal dainties! In other words, he will supply rich food which will cause people to delight. Every chef and cook’s dream! The blessing of Moses includes all things that would make a people very happy—favor with family and earthly security. Of all the sons of Jacob, Asher seems to have received some of the most positive blessings, making his name quite apt.
Beyond just Asher, though, the LORD desired that all Israel be full of joy and take time to delight in Him and rejoice in what He provided them. The LORD appointed certain days and feasts in order that Israel might remember where their bounty came from, but I believe He also wanted to teach them that He was a God of joy, not like the gods of the nations around them who were capricious and angry.
Leviticus 23:40
Deuteronomy 12:5-7, 11-12, 17-18
Deuteronomy 14:22-26
Deuteronomy 16:11, 14-15
Deuteronomy 24:5
Deuteronomy 26:11
Deuteronomy 27:7
Nehemiah 8:9-12, 17
Ezra 6:22 (Nehemiah 12:43)
I’m not sure how anyone could read those verses without acknowledging the truth that the LORD desired His people to rejoice and be happy in His presence. David declared in Psalm 16:11 that before the Face of the LORD (or, in His presence) is satiating joy. Why would we have a joy that completely fills us when we are in the presence of the LORD? Why did He desire Israel to be happy in His presence? Because He is so perfectly filled with joy and happiness Himself!!! Have you ever been in the company of someone who is overwhelmingly happy and been able to remain in a bad mood? If you have, I would say that you have enormous will power. Most people find it virtually impossible to be around someone who is extremely happy without joining them in their happiness.
In fact, that is exactly what the nations are told to do—join with Israel in their rejoicing and happiness. Paul quoted Deuteronomy 32:43 in his letter to Romans (Romans 15:10), and the Greek word he used is similar to the word from which we get “euphoria.” The Hebrew equivalent is ranan, which could be rendered “to emit a great cry of exultation or joy.” Israel raised such a cry when the LORD accepted their offerings (Leviticus 9:24), and that is what we have the enormous privilege of doing right alongside them (Romans 15:7-12).
I’ve mentioned before that I think human beings are creatures of extremes (evidence of which is seen in how we treat food), and I think that is one of the results of Man and Woman’s rebellion against God. We know we were made to experience happiness, but we’ve lost the ability to find it on our own. We deprive ourselves, then indulge, being tossed back and forth between unhappiness and guilt on a never-ending wave of mere existence that has nothing to do with true life. But there’s something to be learned in how we react to extremes in temperature. Both extreme cold and extreme heat produce confusion, incoherence, and the inability to make rational decisions. And that’s exactly what happens to us when we live in the extremes of deprivation followed by indulgence in our unending search for something that will make us happy. We lose the ability to make decisions based on truth and reality.
When you think about it, it’s really no wonder that we indulge in such extremes because our world is full of ugliness and tragedy that too often seems devoid of any reason to rejoice and be happy. And yet, we are told that those who belong to God will experience joy. I’ve seen a lot of people muddle through life not really understanding what that even means, much less experiencing any kind of true joy. Some people have chosen to become sarcastic and cynical as a way of defending themselves against the pain of their reality. I’ve watched way too many bury themselves in serving others, hoping against hope that the “fake it ‘til you make it” mentality will pay off, but all that usually happens is that they wear themselves out. Still others have adopted a persona that on the surface seems incredibly spiritual and deep, and they are always talking about their prayer life and their relationship with God...but...when you really get to know them and start scratching beneath the surface, you start to sense that something is off, and you realize that their spirituality is just as much a defense against their pain as the sarcasm and service is for other people. None of those options bring the joy that the Bible refers to on a very consistent basis. You can’t fake true joy.
The God we serve is a happy God (1 Timothy 1:11), and He desires for His family to experience His happiness. When the exiles had returned from captivity and were weeping over hearing the words of the Torah read to them, they were told that the joy of the LORD was their strength. Jesus told His disciples that He wanted His joy to be in them, and He also prayed for the very same thing (John 15:11; John 17:13). Try to wrap your mind around that. The very joy of the Creator Himself. That’s what He wants each and every one of us to experience.
I think 1 Kings 1:40 gives us an example of what it means to experience the joy of the LORD, and I believe with all my being that this is the kind of celebrating those who call themselves by the name of Jesus should be rehearsing right now. We need to get used to engaging in literal earth-shattering celebrations. Why? Because we aren’t simply celebrating the crowning of an earthly king, like Israel was, we are celebrating the Kingship of Jesus!
Do you know anyone who claims the name of Jesus and yet seems to struggle with being happy? Maybe they have secret pains that they haven’t allowed God to heal, or perhaps they are being weighed down by the burden of this sin-heavy world. My challenge for all of us this Christmas to help our families and friends, and maybe most especially ourselves, to see not Santa Claus but God as the embodiment of joy, cheer, and merriment. I challenge us to be people who radiate the joy that Jesus had within Himself while He was on earth and still has within Himself now in heaven. I challenge us to allow the Holy Spirit to transform us through the Word of God into the happy people of our Happy God!
Now to the Lord sing praises, all you within this place,
And with true love and brotherhood each other now embrace;
Our God did come to rescue us and grant to us His grace.
O, tidings of comfort and joy, comfort and joy,
O, tidings of comfort and joy.
Traditional English Carol,
additional lyrics by A. Hadar