by Richelle Hecker

A place of love

You can listen to today’s devotion by clicking on this SoundCloud link

I recently took a trip back to my hometown. Although my parents no longer live in the house I grew up in I still called my visit, going home. It did not matter that I haven’t lived there for almost thirty years. Nor did it matter that I’ve lived in many other states and another country during that absence. I’ve lived away from there more years than I ever lived there, and yet I was visiting home. Then when I prepared to leave and travel back here I used the same words. I was going home. It struck me as a little bit funny. No matter which direction I went, I was headed toward home.

What makes me call a place where I don’t live, home, as well as the place I do live? Though the scenery in each is spectacular and familiar, it is the people there, and my love for them that makes it home. The location doesn’t matter. I used to have a sign hung up that said, “Home is where the army sends us”, as a reminder that it was not about where we were, but who we were with.

As Christians, we know that this world is not our final home. We live here and move from place to place while we wait to enter our eternal home. What makes Heaven desirable for us is the One there who waits anxiously to greet us with open arms and with a feast he has prepared.

We long to be there with God.

At the same time, because the Holy Spirit lives and dwells in us, we still call this world our home.  We live, rejoice, and love now. What a joy it is to realize that we are home right now while at the same time we look forward to going home.

“For we know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in heaven, not built by human hands.”
2 Corinthians 5:1 New International Version

Enjoy the home He has given you here on earth while you anticipate the home that awaits you in Heaven. You are dearly loved in either place!

Copyright Holy Cross Lutheran Church, Colorado Springs, CO