Maybe it’s just a year of mounting frustration due to everything 2020 has thrown us, from COVID to politics, but the other day I came across a most distressing example of Christmas entitlement and its sad consequence.
Three or four times in the past seven years during the Christmas season, we’ve visited the Larsen home in Campton Hills, near Elburn, IL—about 60 miles west of Chicago. Owner Brian Larsen and his family are avid celebrants of Christmas. Using their own funds and creativity, just for the sheer joy of it, they have developed one of the most spectacular light displays in the region.
It all began fifteen years ago in the rural Illinois countryside. Setting up a light display synced to music, the Larsens turn the family home into a stage from Thanksgiving to the first week of January. Every evening, a twenty-minute program recycles from 5:00-10:00 p.m. (10:30 on the weekends), and it’s free! Sure, they accept donations to help underwrite the outrageous electric bill and pay traffic control personnel, but the funds don’t come close to covering the expenses. Nevertheless, the Larsens don’t mind. It’s a Christmas gift to all.
When we’ve visited, we were fortunate. The longest we waited to get into the parking lot facing the house was around twenty minutes. Nevertheless, waiting in line on the country road from a half mile away, you can see the show and tune your radio to the dedicated FM radio setting—music and lights perfectly harmonizing. But you want to get to the parking lot. The dazzling display fills the front windshield!
Enough is Enough
But owner Brian Larsen has announced this year will be the last for the iconic show—at least at the current location. Over the years, neighbors have been fairly patient. With all the traffic, it’s understandable that they’ve had some frustrations. But the Larsens have done all they can to minimize the headaches—restricted traffic flow, posted signage, hired traffic-control personnel.
Recently, though, the visiting public has pushed the limits. Some ignore the “Do Not Enter” or “Not a Turnaround” signs placed in neighbors’ driveways. After all, they want to turn around and go see the show again! Why should they allow a petty sign to keep them from getting what they want? Other spectators have left trash behind and even, um, “relieved themselves” on the neighbors’ property.
If that weren’t enough to kill the holiday spirit generated by the Larsens’ generosity, other offenses pushed them over the edge. Brian posted the following on the Larsens Christmas Lights Show Facebook page:
For all people whom understand and love the show, and are grateful and respectful WE THANK YOU! However after receiving a number of very disturbing messages and bad reviews, I must make this clear. We won’t tolerate the verbal assaults on the kids and traffic controllers! They are only trying to help! They can’t let you stay for another show, or they can’t fix the fact you couldn’t completely see the show, but swearing and yelling at them will force us to shut this show down! This is why this year’s show is the “last dance.” It used to be, people were grateful and said Merry CHRISTmas and were thankful; when I come in after working this show every night and hear my kids and friends upset at the way they are treated, it literally breaks my heart! We don’t make a profit on this show!… I do this for the pure enjoyment of people! I admit and it saddens me, the success of this show is also its demise.
Why would people act this way at a free Christmas lights display?
Entitlement.
“I’m entitled to the parking spot I want so I can get the best view!”
“I’m entitled to not have to wait 30 minutes to see the show!”
“I’m entitled to stay in my parking spot to see the show again! I shouldn’t have to leave when I”ve only seen it once!”
“I’m entitled to what I want, when I want it! After all, it’s Christmas, isn’t it?!?”
All Too Common
Have you seen this attitude anywhere else at Christmas?
How about in the workplace? For a few years, I served as a chaplain at a local manufacturing facility. The company held an annual Christmas dinner during work hours for the employees, gave away hundreds of dollars in gift cards, and gave more than one day off as paid holidays. But I heard more than one gripe that the company didn’t do enough.
“Don’t know why we don’t get a bonus like other places give!”
“A measly two days off! Should give us the week!”
And so on.
Entitlement.
How about the typical non-COVID year Black Friday sales (which I’ve boycotted!)? Surely, you’ve seen the video footage of people fighting over the year’s most popular toy or electronics gadget.
“I knocked down three people to be the first through the door getting in here! I deserve that!!”
“Well, I got to the pile first! I deserve it!”
Ah, yes. Christmas cheer mixed with an unhealthy dose of entitlement.
Is this how we’re unintentionally programming our kids? Asking a child what he wants for Christmas could very well create the expectation that he’ll actually get it. That’s especially true once he has a couple Christmases under his belt where he got just about everything he said he wanted. How easily he then develops a sense of entitlement on Christmas morning.
How would most American children react if their Christmas stash amounted to a pair of mittens, a candy cane, and an orange (cf. Laura Ingalls’ childhood Christmas gifts mentioned in last week’s post)? Sulking? Anger? Feeling unloved? A sense of entitlement would leave them anything but grateful.
Ironic, Isn’t It?
The irony of all this entitlement junk is that Christmas is about giving a gift that is undeserved. The recipients of the original Christmas gift are in no way entitled to it!
I’m referring, of course, to the coming of the Christ-child.
Though many expected His coming, it wasn’t because they felt entitled. They looked for Him because of a promise given out of sheer grace shortly after man’s choice to reject God and His word in the Garden of Eden. A seed of the woman would come, God promised, who would reverse the deserved curse—not because man is entitled to it, but because God graciously chose to give!
The angelic visitors did not appear to the shepherds on the hillside because they were entitled to special revelation and the exclusive privilege of visiting the newborn babe, wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. No, God graciously gave them the gift. And after they received the gift and had seen the baby, they returned to their sheepfold,
Glorifying and praising God for all the things they had heard and seen as it had been told them.
Luke 2:17-20
Same goes for the magi, those wise men from the east. Why did they see the star? Why did the star lead them to go looking for the one born king of the Jews? Why did it lead them right to the house where Jesus, Mary, and Joseph were staying?
Hint: not because they were entitled to it!
Paul the Apostle speaks of this gift God gave as “indescribable” (1 Corinthians 9:15)—so valuable and great and immense and beyond description and comprehension. A gift no one is entitled to. A gift given out of the incomprehensible love of God.
“For God loved the world in this way, that he gave his only begotten son,” not because the world was entitled to Him. Far from it! In fact, Paul the Apostle makes clear that God gave this gift of His Son, who came to die on the cross the death we deserved, when we were His enemies!
…but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.… For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.
Romans 5:8, 10
“Sinners” and “enemies” have no claim to entitlement.
This gift giving is due to the immeasurable grace of God.
For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this [faith] is not your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.
Ephesians 2:8–9 (ESV emphasis added)
Due to grace…not entitlement. A gift given to be humbly, gratefully received.
Grace, not entitlement. As is the Larsens’ Christmas Light Show…as should be every gift under the tree, regardless of how large or small it might happen to be.
“Christmas” and “entitlement” simply don’t belong together!
