Fans of the Dr. Seuss Christmas special are familiar with the Grinch whose heart was two sizes too small.
The Grinch didn’t understand Christmas until it touched him directly and broke through his initial perception of it.
Perhaps we have something similar happening today with the Gospel.
You can almost hear their version of Matthew 25; “Lord, we saw children alone, afraid, vulnerable and harassed and we cast them out in your name. We knew you were a harsh master and would be pleased that we have protected our borders.
And we knew that in your eyes, every child that dies in the desert or at the hands of a predator is a worthy sacrifice to keep our borders secure. But we know that though there may be hundreds, even thousands, no price is too high.
Related: American Church Community Solves Immigration Crisis
Our children or grandchildren may not understand even now, but we find ourselves standing by the seemingly enduring principles of loving God and country.
And we know that it breaks God’s heart to see these brown-skinned children surge towards our borders, and we might even remember that Jesus himself was a brown-skinned child escaping violence in his own country, finding refuge in Egypt.
We are convinced our borders are sacred, because we have made them so.”
But the Grinch learns that Christmas is not in the gifts, or the names we give things or even who is there; Christmas is in the connection, the welcome, the sense of belonging beyond color or size or dogma or boundary.
The Grinch’s new Christmas is a leap beyond us and them, yours and mine and certainly far beyond defining each other based on which side of an arbitrary line we were born on.
We meet the Grinch when his heart is two sizes too small, by the end of the story his heart has grown three sizes.
This is what the ‘Good news’ looks like, and it didn’t come from testimonies or persuasive theology or even a ‘personal decision’.
The Grinch, like many of us perhaps, was not looking for personal transformation and probably didn’t even want it.
Also by Morf: What Question Would You Ask God?
But the spirit moves, as the Bible tells us, where it will, like the wind.
And when the assurance comes, like a mighty wave, that the Lord will provide, we just might realize that feeding five, or fifty, thousand, is not a miracle, but just the way God works, then, far beyond words or explanations, we will know that the Good News has arrived.
And not just for the Grinch.