I am not entirely sure if it is directly related to my wife, but it is a fact that ever since we got married, a new child mysteriously appears in our apartment from time to time. Over the years, this subtle invasion of small people has grown to such an extent that even my keen eyes could not help but notice them.
And so I, along with Karel Čapek, ask the fundamental question: “What is the purpose of such an infant?” However, Čapek, in the story The Case with the Child, does not arrive at any meaningful answer, and since I found the Bible in the library, I am searching there as well. It is not entirely bad reading, just occasionally hard to grasp what the author intended to say: “Unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom.” (Mt 18:3)
When God has given us so much study material at home, I seized the opportunity and began to study these little people. We have plenty of experimental examples, from tiny silent faces to strong adolescent individuals. What exactly impresses God the Father about this stage of humanity so much that He uses these immature creatures as an example for me, a mature man weathered by the wild winds of Jablonec winters?
Every childhood age is worth following, but the most inspiring are undoubtedly the shortest of our little household inhabitants. They can barely crawl, yet they incredibly persistently seek out my gaze. When I notice this and carefully look into those purest eyes that exist, I gaze in awe through an infinitely beautiful window straight into heaven. Into the longed-for heavenly kingdom. In that gaze of the tiny person, there is not a shred of 'I'! There is only boundless joy that you are here, Dad! And at that moment, even the toughest father cannot help but take that little one into his arms, for the child's joy at the father's presence is utterly disarming. And then I often find myself, like a foolish individual, cooing and babbling to that little creature just to see it smile at me again, so we can relive the joy of having each other and enjoying our time together.
The surprising result of my research turns out to be the revelation that perhaps the Heavenly Father longs for the same thing. Many times a day, He lovingly takes me into His omnipotent arms, so that I can smile, turn my gaze away from my 'I' and all my life’s disasters and unfinished tasks, cease to whine about the weight of fate, and with the eyes of my heart relentlessly look at Him with joy, knowing that we have each other and everything is good between us.
And because we often grow up alongside our children and lose sight of the direction towards the Kingdom, on Christmas, our good Father sends us His Child into the stables of our days. A small Child whose gaze lacks any 'I' at all. And not just the gaze; His entire life bears the slightest 'I'. His death, and especially His resurrection, are thus for us not just a window, but a wide-open gateway to the heavenly kingdom.
Štěpán Pospíšil
