For those of you who read regularly, you know that my 4-year-old just asked if Santa was for real (you can read that story here).  Here’s the thing about Santa…I’m not a fan.  In fact, even as a child, I have no recollection of ever believing in Santa Claus.  I thought he was a fun story.  He was cute.  But I never put any faith in him.  So when Bria asked if he was real, I told her the truth and braced myself for her reaction.  Which actually turned out to be, “Ok, thanks Mom…”  And she went back to playing.

This week she had a field trip in her K4 class to go visit Santa.  I wondered how this would go.  She came home feeling good.  He gave her a teddy bear and she thought he was a really nice man who was very sweet and it was a nice gift.  She named the bear Gingerbread.  No emotional trauma.

Yesterday as the girls were talking about Christmas, my 10-year-old said something about Santa and Bria quickly corrected her and said, “Santa’s not real, Jayden!”  And with those words I felt so much relief.  It reminded me o the jingle from the old Alka-Seltzer commercials.

All 5 of my kids are in now in the know.  They know the ugly truth that Santa isn’t real.  They have the scoop and now we don’t have to spend the energy pretending any more.  We don’t have to tell stories to protect the lie or hide the truth.  We don’t have to play along with the charade.  We can just enjoy Christmas.  And the thing is, we are enjoying Christmas very much without Santa Claus.

What are you spending your energy on….trying to hide the truth?  What lie are you trying to convince people to believe?  What charade are you living in your life?

I wonder what would happen if we actually spent our energy on what God thinks and wants us to do instead of spending it on what people think and what they expect from us?  How much closer would we live to the gospel?  How much more effective would our lives be for the kingdom?  How freeing and peaceful could life actually be?  Oh, what a relief it would be.