A Christmas Carol for the American Dream

Lyrics

[INTRODUCTION] [VERSE 1] We were handed maps in Sunday school And told the road ran straight Past white-picket expectations And a well-earned slice of grace Work hard, keep your head down Hang a wreath upon the door If you do all the right things You’ll be wanting nothing more But Main Street wears a different face Than the one we used to know The lights are still hanging in the windows But nobody seems to glow [PRE-CHORUS] Everybody’s rushing somewhere Everybody’s running late Everybody’s chasing something They can never quite create [CHORUS] This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream For the promises we inherited And the cracks beneath the seams For the ones still searching In the glow of red and green This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream [VERSE 2] A nurse clocks out at midnight A driver pulls another shift A mother wraps her children’s presents Praying somehow they’ll forget That the rent is due on Friday And the cupboard’s running thin While a thousand shining billboards Tell her joy is found within A warehouse hums like Bethlehem If Bethlehem sold speed Packing hope in cardboard boxes For a world convinced by need [PRE-CHORUS] Everybody’s buying comfort Everybody’s buying time Everybody’s looking for salvation On a neon dollar sign [CHORUS] This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream For the people left between the lines Of what success was meant to mean For the tired and forgotten For the names we’ll never read This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream [BRIDGE] And what if Christmas isn’t waiting In the places that we planned? What if God is still arriving Through the cracks we can’t command? Not in towers Not in headlines Not in power Not in gold But among the overlooked Like the story always told What if every glowing storefront And every shining tree Is just borrowed light reminding us Of something we can’t keep? What if all our celebrations And the stories that we tell Are just echoes of a kingdom Breaking quietly through the veil? And what if every manger Is an open invitation? What if hope still wears the face Of holy interruption? [FINAL CHORUS] This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream Will it wake us from our slumber Or pull us deeper into sleep? For the stranger and the neighbor For the ones caught in between This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream This is a Christmas carol For the broken and redeemed This is a Christmas carol For the American Dream [OUTRO] Are we building something lasting Or just decorating the machine? Will this Christmas carol be a wake-up call To what we’ve mistaken for a dream?