{"id":449,"date":"2010-12-13T09:07:49","date_gmt":"2010-12-13T09:07:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/thinplaces\/2010\/12\/why-jesus-is-better-than-santa.html"},"modified":"2010-12-13T09:07:49","modified_gmt":"2010-12-13T09:07:49","slug":"why-jesus-is-better-than-santa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/12\/why-jesus-is-better-than-santa.html","title":{"rendered":"Why Jesus is Even Better than Santa"},"content":{"rendered":"


\n\"nativity.jpg\"<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

I’ve written already about my Christmas-with-kids dilemma (Santa or Jesus?<\/a>). I have two little ones who can’t stop talking about Santa. William
\nsays he dreams about Santa. They want to read books about Santa. Every day, one
\nof them asks, “Will Santa come to my house?”<\/p>\n

The Santa business is fun. It’s fun to hang stockings and
\ntalk about presents and get ready for Christmas morning. I just worry that the
\nexcitement surrounding Santa will overshadow the story of the baby in the manger.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

One reader commented on my post “Santa or Jesus?<\/a>”  that a major difference between Santa and Jesus is that Jesus is a part of our family all year long, not just at Christmas. Eventually, Santa will fade out as it becomes clear to our children that old men in red suits don’t fly around the world depositing gifts on December 24th<\/sup>. Jesus, in contrast, will remain.<\/p>\n

In the car yesterday, Penny was singing, “Santa Claus is Coming to Town.” I noted the similarities between Santa and Jesus. They both can see us when we’re sleeping and know when we’re awake. They both know when we’ve been bad or good. But Santa is a rather cruel taskmaster. The song does begin with a warning: You’d better watch out!<\/i><\/p>\n

How glad I am that Jesus is not the same as Santa.<\/p>\n

Jesus came precisely because we would never be good enough to earn God’s favor. Jesus came to give us new life before<\/i> we managed to clean up our lives. Jesus came and said, I do away with the list of all the things you’ve done wrong.<\/i> You might deserve coal in your stocking, so to speak, but instead I give you an abundance of gifts. They aren’t based upon your goodness. They are based upon my love for you.<\/i><\/p>\n

The gift of the Incarnation is the gift of God’s presence in our everyday lives–our messy, sinful, glorious, mundane lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve written already about my Christmas-with-kids dilemma (Santa or Jesus?). I have two little ones who can’t stop talking about Santa. William says he dreams about Santa. They want to read books about Santa. Every day, one of them asks, “Will Santa come to my house?” The Santa business is fun. It’s fun to hang…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":88,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-449","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith"],"yoast_head":"\nWhy Jesus is Even Better than Santa - Thin Places<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/2010\/12\/why-jesus-is-better-than-santa.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Why Jesus is Even Better than Santa - Thin Places\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I’ve written already about my Christmas-with-kids dilemma (Santa or Jesus?). 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Two major life experiences have shaped her writing and her faith\u00e2\u20ac\u201dcaring for her mother-in-law as she battled cancer and welcoming her daughter Penny into the world after she was diagnosed at birth with Down syndrome. Both experiences expanded and enriched her understanding of what it means to be human and to receive each and every person as a gift.\u00c2\u00a0 A graduate of Princeton University and Princeton Theological Seminary, she is the author of Penelope Ayers: A Memoir, and the forthcoming A Good and Perfect Gift (Bethany House). Her essays have appeared in First Things, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Christian Century, ChristianityToday.com, and Bloom, among other online venues.","sameAs":["http:\/\/amyjuliabecker.com"],"url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/author\/amyjuliabecker"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/88"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=449"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/449\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=449"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=449"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/thinplaces\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=449"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}