Tantrums

My sister in law, Chip, and I are both mothers of 2 year olds who have been testing our limits lately by throwing some pretty good tantrums. Chip, whose 2 year old is her oldest child, told me yesterday that she finally understands why some people call this age "terrible": it is frustrating, to say the least. Chip also posed an interesting question to me yesterday: do you think that Jesus threw tantrums?

We know that Jesus was 2 at some point in time, right? We decided that Jesus probably did throw tantrums, just like any other child asserting his independence, trying to figure out where the boundaries lie, and not having very sophisticated communication skills. After all, the whole point of Jesus coming to the world as a human, as a baby, was for him to have the complete human experience, the good parts and the not so great parts. And I figure it's impossible to really be fully human until one has thrown at least one tantrum. It's hard to imagine the God of the universe kicking and screaming on the floor, but to tell you the truth, it makes me feel better to think of poor little teen-age new mom Mary dealing with 2 year old Jesus throwing himself down and screaming his head off.