On going home

Today is going to be tough.

I don’t like goodbyes.

What I like is the anticipation and excitement of a “hello”.

Yes, I know another hello will come after a goodbye, and you can’t get one without the other, but still you can’t convince me to like them anyway.

Tonight we fly home.

For eleven days now I have anticipated this moment...homesickness has been washing over me like waves on all the beaches we have visited recently...the gravitational pull for all I know and love growing stronger every day.

The only problem is, I know and love what I have here also.

My heart is divided, and no matter which way I look, it hurts.

We have been crazy busy. We haven’t stopped since the plane set down in CT eleven days ago. Non-stop memory-making has been our goal, and my body and mind and emotions tell me we have succeeded.

Now there isn’t anything left to do now but tie up loose ends here, get on the plane, and go home.

Home.

I was talking with someone the other day about home...about how wonderful it is to want to go home. To love your home. To have a home.

And then this person asked me, “But what about when you don’t want to go home...when you would rather not go home?”

And I stopped. And thought. And this weighty question has been heavy on my heart for days.

What then?

Suppose home is not your resting place...the one place in all the world where you are you...where everything about it makes your heart sing?

I know I have been blessed beyond what any fallen human being can be blessed with: a loving husband who serves me like Christ, children and now grandchildren that swell my heart with joy and gratitude, family and friends that have loved me unconditionally and passionately.

And not a day goes by but that I fall on my face before my heavenly Father who has given me these gifts.

He knows I don’t deserve them. I have fallen and risen more times than I can remember.

But in spite of me, He gives. Unconditionally.

And a physical, love-filled home is one of His gifts.

But I know not all feel like I do. Not this person and so many others I have met.

So what about that question? What’s the answer to when you don’t want to go home? What then?

And this is what I have come up with…

Home isn’t a physical place. Not always.

It can be a physical place. But it doesn’t have to be. I have found that out this week, almost a thousand long miles from where I live.

There’s a saying that “Home is where your heart is”.

And another that says, “Where you are, that is home”.

Everyday since I have been here, when I felt alone..separated...disjointed...I have been reminded…

He is my home.

Christ is my home.

And that rang true in every way.

For no matter where I live...and I have lived in a lot of places...from CT to Costa Rica...He has been there.

It is Christ, not my situation or my location, that has been my joy.

Because of Him, no matter where I am, I can find hope. And peace. And love.

In the good times and the bad. The easy and the hard.

Years ago, I read a booklet called, “My Heart, Christ’s Home.”

Today I’m blogging on, “Christ, my Home”.

I may not get a chance to verbally share this truth with the person who asked me this question.

But maybe they will read this blog.

And be encouraged.

And home won’t be such a difficult place anymore.

That is my hope. And my prayer.

As I leave to go home.