A Christmas Carol Series ~ Stave Two

It’s hard to appreciate a sunny sky is if you’ve never endured a dreary day.  Can you really know companionship if you have never experienced loneliness?  And it is such a contrast that we see in Stave Two when the Ghost of Christmas Past takes Scrooge to the school house.  We don’t see the crusty curmudgeon who chases away an innocent caroler with a ruler.  We see a young, helpless boy who is a victim of his circumstances that are beyond his control.  We get a glimpse of what has made this person we know as Scrooge.  Events in our past shape the way we show love in our present and future.

When we are vulnerable, we cannot help what happens to us.  Friends and family repeatedly forgot Scrooge when he was a boy.  Some of these undoubtedly were acts of omission and some acts of commission.  We can be reasonably sure that his friends didn’t intentionally leave him in the school house when Christmas recess came.  They were focused on their own families coming to retrieve them.  The fact that his own family left him is more overt.  We are never given a glimpse of why his father left him at the school, but we see the result.  We see the lonely boy, and we see the pain the memory of the occasion still elicits in the calloused man.  The fact that Scrooge experienced that rejection and the fact that he still dealt with the pain of it decades later were beyond his control.  

Our power lies within the ways we respond to our past.  Scrooge carried the pain of abandonment.  His pain drove him to set up a financial empire so he would never again be powerless, and his zeal strangled the love in his life.  His pain multiplied.  But later in life, he held the power of choice when it came to his interactions with his nephew and his clerk.  We all have events in our past that were thrust upon us, and those events still rear their heads in our present.  However, we hold the power to decide the level of impact those events continue to hold over us.  Especially, when it comes to the way we treat others around us, we hold the power as the to the direction that impact will take us.

Discussion Questions

Think of the unpleasant dealings Scrooge had with people with during Christmas Eve morning: Bob Cratchit, Fred, his nephew, the young caroler, the business men seeking donations for the poor.  How did those present day dealings relate to moments of his past?

What made Scrooge begin to reflect on the way he had recently treated people?

Why did he begin to desire to change?

A Christmas Carol Series ~ Stave Two

It’s hard to appreciate a sunny sky is if you’ve never endured a dreary day.  Can you really know companionship if you have never experienced loneliness?  And it is such a contrast that we see in Stave Two when the Ghost of Christmas Past takes Scrooge to the school house.  We don’t see the crusty curmudgeon who chases away an innocent caroler with a ruler.  We see a young, helpless boy who is a victim of his circumstances that are beyond his control.  We get a glimpse of what has made this person we know as Scrooge.  Events in our past shape the way we show love in our present and future.

When we are vulnerable, we cannot help what happens to us.  Friends and family repeatedly forgot Scrooge when he was a boy.  Some of these undoubtedly were acts of omission and some acts of commission.  We can be reasonably sure that his friends didn’t intentionally leave him in the school house when Christmas recess came.  They were focused on their own families coming to retrieve them.  The fact that his own family left him is more overt.  We are never given a glimpse of why his father left him at the school, but we see the result.  We see the lonely boy, and we see the pain the memory of the occasion still elicits in the calloused man.  The fact that Scrooge experienced that rejection and the fact that he still dealt with the pain of it decades later were beyond his control.  

Our power lies within the ways we respond to our past.  Scrooge carried the pain of abandonment.  His pain drove him to set up a financial empire so he would never again be powerless, and his zeal strangled the love in his life.  His pain multiplied.  But later in life, he held the power of choice when it came to his interactions with his nephew and his clerk.  We all have events in our past that were thrust upon us, and those events still rear their heads in our present.  However, we hold the power to decide the level of impact those events continue to hold over us.  Especially, when it comes to the way we treat others around us, we hold the power as the to the direction that impact will take us.

Discussion Questions

What are the different scenes and details Dickens uses to set up the contrast of seeing young Scrooge alone in the school room?
What do you think and feel when you see young Scrooge sitting alone?
What differences do you see between the Scrooge at Fezziwig’s shop and the one whom we greet at the beginning of the story?  How do you account for the difference?
Is there any conflict in Scrooge as he watches the girl walk away?  If so, how do we know?
How might his past experiences impact his present relationships?  With Bob Cratchit?  With Fred?

A Christmas Carol Series ~ Stave One

“It is required of every man,” the Ghost returned, “that the spirit within him should walk abroad among his fellow-men, and travel far and wide; and if that spirit goes not forth in life, it is condemned to do so after death. It is doomed to wander through the world—oh, woe is me!—and witness what it cannot share, but might have shared on earth, and turned to happiness!”

page 16, Dover Thrift Editions

You see a kitten shivering on the curb in a downpour.  You see an a stooped-over, white haired woman holding a sack of groceries and struggling to lug her walker onto the bus.  You see a young girl in a stained, tattered dress looking longingly at a cheap doll on the store shelf as you hear her mother say “We just don’t have the money.”

It has been put in us by our Creator to want to help.

Marley shows us the abject frustration that arises from losing the ability to give care and compassion to fellow travelers in this world.  From his multiple utterances, “woe is me,” to his outburst of pure aggravation with Scrooge for not being accepting of the chance that Marley is supernaturally providing him, his despondency at his lost opportunity to help is stark.

Many changes happen inside of us when we begin to take on the image of Christ.  One key change is in how we look at helping people.  When you follow Christ, the opportunity to help others transforms from drudgery to opportunity.

Marley, who like Scrooge, never bothered to look up from his financial registers found himself in a position where now he could not look down.  All he could see was need, but he had no ability to meet the need.  And now his lack of ability fills him with remorse.  When we finally help someone, it feels good.  When we see someone going without, it feels empty.  While we live in this life, we have the option to avoid the feelings of remorse and fill ourselves with the satisfaction of having done good.  But what if we lose that opportunity?

Discussion Questions

What is the significance of Marley’s chains and the ledgers and cashboxes connected to it?
When Scrooge tells Marley he doesn’t believe he is really there, why does Marley cry out?
What motivates Marley to appear to Scrooge?
Explain what Marley means when he says “Woe is me.”

A Christmas Carol Series ~ Stave One

Are you putting yourself out there?  Have you ever been asked that question?  It might relate to making friends—  Are you making yourself approachable so that others know you are not closed off?  Or it might relate to romantic involvement—  Are you sending the signals to that special someone so he or she might know you are interested?  A third possibility relates to your professional endeavors—  Are you taking on the projects and producing a work load that is going to get you noticed?  But for the follower of Christ, it has a different application.

In Scrooge, we see the anti-type of a follower of Christ.  He underpays his clerk and makes him work in deplorable conditions.  He spurns the unconditional offers of love and friendship from his nephew.  And he antagonizes the charitable gentlemen who want nothing but a small donation with which to do good.  Scrooge is certainly not putting himself out there.

For the follower of Christ, the corollary to the Great Commandment exemplifies putting oneself out there.  When Jesus said “…and a second which is like it: love your neighbor as yourself,” he gave us the supreme guidance for putting ourselves out there.  And it is not so we can receive the benefit.  It is so those around us can benefit. How does the follower of Christ put himself or herself out there?  They do it by finding an object of Christ-like love.

Discussion Questions

Who in Stave One was putting themselves out there?
How had Scrooge closed himself off?
How had Scrooge’s pursuit of success caused him to deal with the people around him?  (How had it made him deal with Bob Cratchit?  How had it made him deal with his nephew, Fred?  How did it make him respond to the two gentlemen seeking donations?  Others?)
Do you see any tendencies of Scrooge in yourself?
Who are you likely to cross paths with tomorrow that could use a simple demonstration of love?

Do you ever feel like Christmas needs to be refocused?

Christmas is a celebration of the one whose birth we celebrate.  Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol because he saw how far many had drifted from the principles that undergirded the day.

Join me in reading A Christmas Carol to sharpen the focus of Christmas.

Over four weeks starting the day after Thanksgiving, we will read together, think about and apply the lessons that Scrooge learned as he traveled with the spirits on that Christmas Eve178 years ago.  We will take lessons specifically regarding how a Christian should approach Christmas time and the reading of this classic.