All the discount department stores are doing it and they all advertised it in a big way.  Layaway is back.  Just like the old days.  Mostly toys ended up in the back rooms.  Just like the old days.  Maybe a few more children and grandchildren can have a happy Christmas like so many of their friends.  Just like the old days. 

It was a great idea.  But somewhere the marketing people got a late start.  The ads popped up around Thanksgiving.  Put a little down and pay some every week and they are yours pretty much pain-free.  Sounds pretty good.  Just like the old days.  But they didn’t push it until four weeks before Christmas.  That’s only one or two checks away.  Not many weeks to pay some.  Not like the old days.

But people tried.  They made the down payment.  They got the early payments in.  But then reality hit.  There are other children and grandchildren to buy for.  There are still bills to pay and food to buy.  The payments got smaller.  The balance stalled.  Christmas is less than a week away and now what?

Who knows how it started but somewhere, somebody took notice.  And the movement was born.  All across the country mostly anonymous benefactors are paying off strangers’ layaway balances.  The Layaway Angels have come to town.  Every town!

In Davenport, Iowa one Angel paid off 14 accounts including one account so delinquent that it was a day away from its merchandise being put back on the shelves.  In Indianapolis a woman paid off fifty accounts in memory of her late husband.  In Kapolei, Hawaii someone paid off 15 layaway accounts then handed out $100 bills to shoppers.  In Miami two Angels combined their resources to settle as many accounts as $400 could pay off.

Many of us have taken part in another Christmas tradition of giving, the Angel Tree.  Children’s services, older adults’ facilities, inner city ministries, and others team up with churches, school groups, and employers to select from unknown recipients and buy presents for under their tree.  Countless people, probably into the millions, have benefited from these anonymous gifts.

But the Layaway Angels are different.  These people are getting into the grittiest of the nitty-gritty.  They aren’t afraid of going right to the people who need some help.  And they aren’t afraid to admit that those people who need some help live and shop right alongside them.  These gifts are going up the road, across town, two blocks over, down the street.   They are going to people whose faces they’ve seen without knowing who they are.  They are going to children who have cried with longing in stores and who are going to get to squeal with delight at home.

Layaway Angel, Angel Tree, Secret Santa – so many ways to say Merry Christmas to those who aren’t close enough to hear it, but who deserve to hear it spoken loudly.  And if one of you reading is an Angel – Merry Christmas to you, too!

Now, that’s what we think.  Really.  How ‘bout you?