I never noticed that. — Scrooge, in the 1984 movie version, after the Ghost of Christmas Past points out that Belle “resembled your sister”.
Scrooge’s life
went astray sometime when he was a young man. We can, with reasonable
certainty, say he didn’t wake up one morning and think, Hm. I’m
content where I am. I’m enjoying my apprenticeship with Old Fezziwig. I’m in
love with a beautiful young woman. I have friends. But I think I’ll begin
morphing into a money-centric fool who loses his way, gives up his girl, cuts
off his friendships, and winds up as a bitter old miser living in a drafty old
house, my life utterly devoid of the slightest semblance of joy — even if it
would make a great book by, say, Charles Dickens, assuming I were visited by
four eccentric Ghosts.
No, it happened insidiously, as if one of the tires on our car gets out of
alignment and starts to wear heavily on the outside edge. But we don’t check on
it. And the problem gets worse. It affects the other tires. Soon our steering
wheel shakes like an out-of-kilter washing machine agitator, and our car is
unsafe to drive. Either that or we crash.
In the 1984 movie version, the Ghost of Christmas Present calls out Scrooge for
letting life pass him by. “You’ve gone through life not noticing a lot,” the
Spirit says. In the same movie version, at the end, Scrooge tells his nephew
Fred, “I see the shadow of your mother in your face. I forgot how much I loved
her. Perhaps I chose to forget.”
We need to live intentionally, with our antennae up. We need to notice our life
as we’re living it. Why? For three reasons. The first is to appreciate all that
God has blessed us with. Given the chance to live their lives again, fifty
octogenarians were asked by sociology professor and author Tony Campolo what
they would do differently. They said they would risk more, would do more things
that would live on after they were dead, and would reflect more on the journey
while they were on it.
To not pay attention is to miss the wonder of being alive.
To miss the people around us, the needs around us, and the beauty around us.
And we miss the umbrella above it all: The God who loves us unconditionally.
In these days of multitasking, social media, and dawn-to-dusk rushing around, I
wonder if we’re going too fast to do so. Or if we’ve fooled ourselves into
believing that we’re accomplishing so much, when what we’re really doing is
making treasure of the trivial — immersing ourselves in making money, for
example, at the expense of building relationships. Or if subconsciously we purposely go
too fast — to avoid having to face a compulsive “us” that we might not want to
face.
Dickens grew up as a keen observer of the world and his place in it. Sickly and
frail, he was much more participant than athlete. “He loved to watch people at
church, in the market, at school,” writes Norrie Epstein, author of The
Friendly Dickens. Not surprisingly, he became a writer, an observer
of — and commentator on — the human condition.
In Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, Emily, who died while
giving birth to her second child, is given a chance to witness the day she
turned twelve. In doing so, she realizes all the nuances of life she would
never again see.
“It goes so fast,” she says. “We don’t have time to look at one another.
Goodbye world… Goodbye to clocks ticking… and Mama’s sunflowers. And food
and coffee. And new-ironed dresses and hot baths… and sleeping and waking up.
Oh, earth, you’re too wonderful for anybody to realize you… Do any human
beings ever realize life while they live it — every, every minute?”
“No,” replies the stage manager, then pauses. “The saints and poets, maybe —
they do some.”
Second, we need to notice what’s going on around us so we can be there for
others. Thomas Hood, in an article appearing a year after A Christmas
Carol was released, wondered if, like Scrooge, “our own heads
have not become more inaccessible, our hearts more impregnable, our ears and
eyes more dull and blind, to sounds and sights of human misery.”
We can’t help others if we don’t notice their needs. In the 1938 Christmas
Carol movie, starring Reginald Owen as Scrooge, the Ghost of
Jacob Marley tells Ebenezer, “Each day a man has a thousand chances to make
right.” But not if that man doesn’t notice those opportunities.
Finally, we need to notice what’s going on around us to keep us headed in the
right direction in our lives. I was sailing in the San Juan Islands off
Washington State, deep in conversation with my sailing buddy. Suddenly I
realized we were far off course. Why? Tides had shifted, and I had been too
preoccupied to notice.
So, too, did the tides shift in Scrooge’s life. Perhaps he could have
compensated had he kept his eyes on the headland where he was originally aimed
and noticed the shifting tides in his life. But once we lose sight of land,
once we can’t see — or won’t notice — where we’re headed, the shoals grow
hungry for the catch.
Said Albert Einstein, “He to whom the emotion is a stranger, who can no longer
pause to wonder and stand wrapped in awe, is as good as dead; his eyes are
closed.”
Excerpted with permission from 52
Little Lessons from A Christmas Carol by Bob Welch,
copyright Thomas Nelson.
Are you awake? Are you aware of where you are headed? Do you want to reach the
end of life wishing you’d done more for others and been more in touch with the
life going on around you? What do you need to wake up to today? How do we need
to refocus in order to live the best God-powered and God-directed lives
possible? Come join the conversation on our blog. We’d love to hear from you!
