Dec. 21, 2025 - The Hope of Christmas Future

In this final supernatural visit, the old miser is shown the aftermath of his own death. He witnesses strangers selling his possessions to a fence, laughing that he wouldn't need them anymore. He hears people across the city celebrating the death of someone whose actions had actively harmed their lives. The revelation hits with devastating clarity—they're talking about him. His death brings joy to others because his life brought them misery.

But there's another tombstone in this vision, one that breaks through even his hardened heart: Tiny Tim, the young son of his underpaid clerk, has also died. The weight of these revelations crushes him. He's facing what might be called a "dark redeeming night of the soul"—that moment when we're confronted with the full weight of who we've become and the impact we've had on the world around us.

In desperation, he makes a plea: "I will honor Christmas in my heart. I will try to keep it all the year long. I will live in the past, the present, and the future. The spirits of all three shall strive within me. I will not shut out the lessons that they teach."

And then, just when all seems lost, he wakes up. The night is over. Morning has arrived. He's been given a second chance—an opportunity to become a new creation, to drop the problems of his past and become the person he knows he can be rather than the person he's been.

The Miracle of Transformation
This transformation captures something essential about the Christmas message itself. The celebration of that holy birth isn't just about a historical event two thousand years ago—it's about the manifestation of God doing a new thing in creation. It's about the promise that nobody is past the point of redemption, that there's always a way forward for each of us.

The beauty of this redemption story is that it speaks to a central truth of the gospel: we don't have to face the darkness within ourselves alone. We have someone who walks with us through the hard places of our lives and helps us emerge on the other side as new and beautiful creations. God makes new ways in the wilderness of our lives and creates rivers to revitalize our spirits.

Beyond the Chains We Forge
One of the most haunting images from earlier in the story is that of the miser's former business partner, bound in heavy chains forged link by link through years of greed and selfishness. These chains represent something very real—the weight of our choices, the accumulated burden of living disconnected from love and compassion.

But here's the good news: the whole point of Christmas is that those chains don't have to hold us. The Christ child came to eliminate the barriers we put up, to break the chains we develop for ourselves. This is an immense action of love that we can barely comprehend.

Seeing What God Sees
Perhaps the most remarkable aspect of this redemption is what it reveals about how God views us. God looks at us—with all the ways we can be like that cold-hearted miser—and sees creatures deserving of love. God sees the best of who we can be instead of the worst of who we've been.

This is nothing short of miraculous. We often struggle to see past our own failures and shortcomings. We're blinded by the world we've constructed for ourselves, unable to recognize where we've gone astray. But God's vision isn't limited by our blindness. God continually sees our potential and works to help us become more than the sum of what we've been.

The Call to Awakening
Many people experience a moment of being "shaken awake" at the core of their being—a crisis that forces them to confront who they've become. While these moments can be transformative, they don't have to be the only path to change. We don't need to suffer in order to find something good, life-giving, and affirming.

The invitation of Christmas is to embrace transformation before we hit rock bottom, to open ourselves to God's redeeming work in our lives before we're forced to face the consequences of our hardness of heart. We can choose to live into the spirit of past, present, and future—learning from where we've been, engaging fully with where we are, and moving toward the glorious future God envisions for us.

A New Creation
When that old miser woke up on Christmas morning, he was simultaneously himself and not himself. He was the same person, yet completely transformed. He had moved through darkness and emerged into light, ready to live differently, love more fully, and embrace the second chance he'd been given.

This is the promise available to all of us. God wants something better for us than what we can achieve on our own. The chains of our past, the coldness of our present, the bleakness of our future—none of these have to define us. Because of Christmas, because of that child who came to earth, we can truly live.

This Christmas season, may we embrace the miracle of transformation, allowing God to make streams in the desert places of our lives and to help us become the people we were created to be.