“Every day, every decision, is an opportunity”
Christmas is fast approaching. People are worried about decorations, Christmas cards, shopping, and the like, trying to balance (or even find) meaning in the season through all of the materialism and commercialism that takes the forefront. I’ve been visiting family after losing my wife to Alzheimer’s this fall, so my decorations and card sending will have to wait until after I get home.
While visiting my brother, who literally lives in the middle of nowhere in Missouri (Google-maps came close to getting his actual location from the address while my brand-new car’s navigation system could only find a town about 11 miles away), he and my sister-in-law insisted I watch a recent Christmas movie called “Red One.”
I vaguely remembered reading a review about it that mildly criticized it for being about Christmas (really Santa Claus) without ever mentioning Jesus or anything remotely religious. As one who often tries to remind people that “Jesus is the reason for the Season,” I felt the movie, although quite enjoyable in its talk of “saving Christmas,” was deficient because of this. Christmas is more than Christmas trees.
However, reflecting on much of the content of the movie itself, there were many significant moral lessons that apply to everyone, Christians or otherwise. These ranged from issues of the choices we make in our lives and their consequences (and responsibility for those choices) to opportunities to obtain grace (the word grace isn’t there, but the concept is) and even including the idea of repentance and that it’s never too late to change from the naughty list to the nice list.
The story is built around Santa’s lists— “naughty and nice,” which he is always checking twice. The evil character, Gryla (witch or an ogre or both), is angry because despite Santa’s tending to the folks on the nice list, the naughty list keeps getting longer and no one seems to be getting punished for their naughtiness. Perhaps she identifies with Thomas Sowell who often relates the deterioration of society to the fact that so many people (especially decision makers) seem to never have to deal with the consequences of their decisions.
This is one of the themes of this movie. Everything in life is a choice. Or, looked at another way, everything in life is an opportunity. And that choice/opportunity is related to one of two priorities of the individual involved—self or others. This isn’t a new idea. Even Charles Dickens classic A Christmas Carol points to the theme of choosing and taking responsibility for those choices. Usually this equates to a choice between good or evil. The choice then between good and evil equates to choosing God or choosing against God. Make the right choice and receive grace. And note well, God will not interfere with our choice, our free will. Therefore we reap what we sow. “Before a man are life and death, good and evil, and whichever he chooses will be given him.” (Sir 15:17)
And the initial choices don’t have to be big evils to set one moving in the wrong direction. As C.S. Lewis notes in The Screwtape Letters, through the words of the experienced demon, Screwtape, “The first job of [these] Tempters was to harden these choices of the Hell-ward roads into a habit by steady repetition.” Screwtape expands on this noting “Indeed, the safest road to Hell is the gradual one–the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.”
The movie begins with Santa (“Red,” played by J.K. Simmons) getting out to mingle with his constituents along with his bodyguard (head of North Pole security), who is also discouraged by the lack of improved behavior and growing “naughty” list. The bodyguard, Callum Drift, played by Dwayne Johnson, tells Santa he wants to resign (after hundreds of years of service—Santa has been around a long time). Santa also obviously has protection from various secret government entities. On his return to the shield protected North Pole, just prior to Christmas, Santa is kidnapped. The security team begins to panic, contacting other secret support entities, and initiates a search for Santa. They begin by trying to find out how Santa’s North Pole location could have been found, leading them to level four naughty list hacker Jack O’Malley played by Chris Evans.
So here is where the movie takes a turn and really gets to the important lesson. Just as God seems to pick the most unlikely people on which to depend (think of St. Peter who denied Christ three times), Jack is found to have hacked into the system which, through seismic sensors, indicated the probable location of the North Pole, and now is called upon to help rectify the situation. Callum and Jack embark on a number of adventures in an effort to pin down not only who kidnapped Red, but also his location. In the process we also learn that Jack, a divorcee, is also pretty much a dead-beat dad, reinforcing his standing as a level four naughty. In the process, Jack and his son (Dylan), who only wanted his father’s love and attention, get captured by Gryla and imprisoned in magical snow globes, by which she planned to imprison all those on the naughty list forever.
Jack and his son can still talk, and Jack begins to reflect on his failings in life and as a father and repents which causes the snow globes to break, thus freeing himself and his son. Jack, as well as some of the other characters resume their search and rescue operation even showing willingness to sacrifice on behalf of the goal of “saving Christmas.”
In the end, Gryla is defeated and even Santa and his brother (Krampus—kind of a not so good counterpart to Santa) reconcile and Santa is able to make his Christmas eve rounds, taking Jack and Dylan along. Obviously, due to his conversion, repentance, and sacrifice, Jack has transitioned from the naughty list to the nice list, much like Scrooge in A Christmas Carol.
We tend to focus more on our behavior at this time of year. Sometimes we get caught up in the true sense of the season, but we are also captured by the idea that there might be something in it for us. In Dickens’ story, Scrooge learned to honor Christmas all year round. That lesson is not so evident in “Red One,” but is suggested by Jack’s reconciliation with his son. In either case it is part of the lesson we need to learn. It is never too late to change and come back to the good (God), there will probably be sacrifice, but we all have free will, so the choice is up to us. Each event in our lives is an opportunity involving a choice. “See, I have today set before you life and good, death and evil.” (Deuteronomy 30:15). Which will you choose?
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