Who Is My Neighbor?

On Monday, I introduced the topic of community helpers to my kindergarteners with the help of my Uncle Jeff, a pilot, who came to visit. Later in the day we were discussing what a community is and how community helpers help those living within the community. We decided that our classroom is a community, as well as our school and our neighborhoods. We even defined our state, our country, and the world as larger communities.

Then, one of my students suggested that God was a community, or maybe part of one. "What do you think?" I asked. I wasn't sure how to respond. I sure wasn't sure what I thought. I wonder, as I believe my students do, Is God ever part of our human community? Does God want to be part of us, to "pitch his tent" among us, as Jewish tradition suggests? Or are we too presumptive, too bold to consider God, in some ways, as "one of us?" Perhaps we spend a disproportionately low amount of energy on the idea of God as a member, if not the most important one, in every and all of our communities. Perhaps we strive to remember and care for all of our human neighbors and we forget that God shelved his divinity to live as a person for awhile and desires the same commitment to him that we give to others. Or maybe that thought isn't differentiating enough between who is human and who is divine.

So, who has an answer for my kindergarten friends? Is God part of our community? Who is my neighbor?