Dear one,
Both negatively and positively, the word “home” evokes various feelings, thoughts, and/or images within most of us. For some of us “home” signifies a structure, which provides protection from the vicissitudes of wind and rain, heat and cold. For others of us, “home” also bespeaks an emotional environment: physical warmth and protection might be integral to that emotional environment, but relational warmth and protection far outweigh a warm oven and cinnamon, or wood chips and pine.
As fundamental as these “homeward” characteristics are to us, at this writing they are very present for me: First, in a week I will be en route to Romania, where I will have the privilege of encouraging church leaders in Giurgiu (on the Danube), and then pastors in Sinaia (in the Carpathians). Following Sinaia and the pastoral conference, I will have the gift of travel in Israel with members from the Zionsville Presbyterian Church. In all, I will be en route for over three weeks, which means I will be pleased to return home—and especially to Mary.
And second, because we are in the Season of Lent, I am reminded that the Lenten “journey” culminates in Good Friday and Easter Sunday—but always in the light of Jesus’ promise to His disciples:
“In my Father's house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also” (John. 14:2-3).
Within this promise, the word translated “house” (ἐν τῇ οἰκίᾳ) does equally suggest “home” and “family.” Likewise, the word translated “rooms” (μοναὶ), although rightly translated bears the nuasce of “life” and “remaining.” In other words, Jesus promised a “home” and a “family”— a “forever family”—with Him and His Father.[1]
It might simply be a factor of my age, but I don’t think so; rather, I believe there is within us that longing for “home,” where and when we can be “at home” within ourselves, with one another, and at home with the One who loves us as no other. Lent, I believe, directs us to our true “home.”
Homeward,
Stan
Ps. With you I grieve for the thousands in Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Malawi who have lost their homes—their lives—to Cyclone Idia. They have no infrastructure to protect them against such devastations, and none from which to build. Please pray and give through well-established agencies.
[1]Cf. John 14:23, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”