“Oh, you better watch out, you better not cry,” we kids used to sing at Christmas time. I guess first-graders still admonish one another musically, “You better not pout; I’m a’telling you why.” And then comes the pseudo-warning that “Santa Claus is coming to town.”
Of course we never believed a word of it. But it was still great fun to scream out the song in our shrill six-year-old voices. The tune and the lyrics had a lilt guaranteed to jive up a juvenile heart. And the mocking seriousness of the song’s threat made our souls smile because we knew the words were not true. Santa Claus was not really coming, and even the most impish brat in the elementary school choir knew his Christmas presents would appear under the tree despite his delinquent behavior.
I suppose, though, that the sinister “theology” of this little Christmas ditty might actually alter the antics of a preschooler if the child genuinely believed in Santa Claus.
“He knows when you are sleeping; he knows when you’re awake,” is pretty heavy stuff for a three-year-old. “He knows if you’ve been bad or good.” Wow! With a Christmas tree twinkling in the den and stockings hanging all over the house to whet a kid’s guess-what-I’m-gonna-get-for-Christmas hopes, the threat of an all-seeing, all-knowing Santa ought to be sufficiently menacing to scare even the most churlish child into angelic decorum at least for a Yuletide week or so.
Do you see where I’m headed? My point is a simple one, but it’s a mighty important one to folks who hope for heaven.
The only people who behave better because “Santa Claus is coming to town” are those who believe in Santa Claus—those who think he’s really coming.
Behavior modification depends on unquestioning belief.
That’s exactly how it works with the Bible’s assurances that Jesus is coming to town someday. We shape up our act and clean up our lives only if we truly believe in him. Only if we are convinced that he really is coming.