Finding Home

I've moved a lot in my lifetime.  More times than I care to admit.  A lot of it seems to be work related but I think there is something deeper that isn't so obvious.  It seems to me that for years I've been trying so hard...chasing this thing...a place I can just call home.

For as far back as I can remember, no place I have ever lived felt like home to me.  The residence I occupied only served as just a stop between where I moved from to where I was moving next. To shed a little light into my past, I have never lived anywhere longer than 3 years in my life.  I'm 38 right now so do the math and add 20 and you might be close to the number of times I've packed and unpacked paper towel boxes that I have fished out of the back of the local dollar general store.

For years I thought that once we were able to buy a house things would change.  You know, obtain the american dream, go into massive debt, and settle down.  Not so my friend. Not so at all.  I spent so much time chasing this idea that I never addressed the underlying issue of why no place has ever felt like home.

So here we are again, contemplating relocating to make things better for our family.  This time the move is based largely on one thing...being closer to the one place that for a few fleeting moments during the week actually feels like home.  The moments when I'm worshiping in the presence of God, in the midst of our church family.

Maybe I'm unique in this way or maybe this is somehow by divine design.  Maybe nothing in this earth is supposed to feel like home.  Maybe we put too much focus seeking our own kingdom when once we obtain what we think we want, it isn't what we needed at all.

In Matthew 8:20 Jesus said "foxes have dens and birds have nests but the son of man has no place to lay his head".  Jesus didn't say this casually.  This statement was a proclamation of the cost of following him.  No promises of the american dream and for that matter, no promises of even a place to sleep.

With all of this in mind, if it's my lot in life to never find that feeling of home in any other place other than God's presence then so be it.  If I ever found a home of my own on this earth that finally felt like home, no matter what I did, it could be swept away by the whims of this world.  If my focus remains on God's kingdom first though, no matter if I have a place to live or a bed to lay my head on, I will always know where my eternal home will be.