Remembering Home

Home is a place of residence, origin, permanence, stability. Home is a place of welcome and warmth, feasting and fellowship. Home is brimming with truth, beauty, safety. It’s a place for which we long, however do not truly know. 

Often— whether literally, figuratively or both— we find ourselves uprooted Pilgrims, wandering and wondering. We pack and unpack boxes. We say goodbyes. At times, we sit alone. And yet, at other times, we sit surrounded by chaos. We wonder about next steps, about job offers, about former families, about future families. And in doing so, we ache for our permanent Father and His permanent Table. 

So as we traverse the earth, let us engage in the sacred act of remembering God and Home. And by remembering, allow God to instill and enliven hope within our feeble, often discouraged frames. Let us remember how God initiated Home with Adam and Eve in the Garden. Let us remember how God humbled Himself to wilderness travel in a portable Tabernacle. Let us remember how God built and rebuilt the Temple. Let us remember how Jesus not only pitched His tent among us but also took on our skin and dress and weakness. Let us remember how the Spirit now delights to make His home in us. 

God made Home. To us, God brought Home – Himself. And He is preparing our final Home even as He indwells us. Therefore, may we have hope. And may we, together, take heart until our true Home comes.

Psalm 84

How lovely is your dwelling place, LORD Almighty! My soul yearns, even faints, for the courts of the LORD; my heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.

Even the sparrow has found a home, and the swallow a nest for herself, where she may have her young— a place near your altar, LORD Almighty, my King and my God. Blessed are those who dwell in your house; they are ever praising you.

Blessed are those whose strength is in you, whose hearts are set on pilgrimage. As they pass through the Valley of Baka, they make it a place of springs; the autumn rains also cover it with pools. They go from strength to strength, till each appears before God in Zion.

Hear my prayer, LORD God Almighty; listen to me, God of Jacob. Look on our shield, O God; look with favor on your anointed one.

Better is one day in your courts than a thousand elsewhere; I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of the wicked. For the LORD God is a sun and shield; the LORD bestows favor and honor; no good thing does he withhold from those whose walk is blameless. LORD Almighty, blessed is the one who trusts in you.

Reference: Keeping Place: Reflections on the Meaning of Home by Jen Pollock Michel