God Is Our Size!

by Elizabeth Bettenhausen:
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"God’s my size! " The three-year-old girl jumped up and ran to tell her mother. "Mom, God's my size!" She got the idea while lying on her stomach looking at the creche beneath the Christmas tree. Eye-level with a baby is a good position from which to do theology.

At Christmas God is newborn, less like Michaelangelo's muscular men and more like an infant in wet diapers sucking milk from its mother's breast. God is less like an equation in theoretical physics and more like a hungry three-year-old in a refugee camp. At Christmas God is less like a come-of-age, postmodern adult and more like the toddler laughing at being able to walk.


Adults look at the baby and say, "This can't be God! This is a bawling baby!" The protests are diverse. "This can't be God! This baby is Jewish. This baby is poor. This baby is illegitimate. This baby is male. This baby is traditional. This baby is a refugee. This baby is, well, a baby."

Children look at the baby and say, "God's our size!"

Adults look at the baby, shuffle their feet in the straw, and mutter to each other:

"Adoptionist Christology is preferable to Incarnation."

"The Ancient Near East was full of Incarnation myths."

"Doesn't Mary look well, theologically speaking?" "This wouldn't be necessary except for sin."

"This would he necessary even without sin."

"When he's older he’ll amount to something."

Meanwhile, children touch and say, "God’s our size!"
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The entire article can be read here.