Or…why I don’t want to be a Grinch
One of my favorite Christmas stories is “The Grinch Who Stole Christmas.” I dig it for so many reasons. What I like the most is the Grinch’s revelation that Christmas is about something more than just presents.
Do you remember what happens in that moment?
His heart grew three sizes! It finally had room for the real meaning of Christmas and he finds the strength of ten Grinches!
I was reading in Psalm 119:25–32 today and this last verse hit me between the eyes,
I will run in the way of your commandments
when you enlarge my heart!
The psalmist is acutely aware that he needs a larger heart. Our hearts start so small and there’s not enough room. We need new ones, bigger ones, ones that have room for the commandments. I love this image!
It reminds me of something that C.S. Lewis said in Mere Christianity,
“Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of — throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself.”
This process “hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense.” When he’s finished it’s a palace, that he “intends to come and live in it Himself.”
I am so much like the Grinch. My heart needs to grow. To love well, to love like Jesus loved, it needs to grow!
Does yours?
My Heart is Too Small was originally published in The Rev on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.