Where is my home?
Friday, July 15, 2016
I've recently returned from a couple of weeks in Sydney.
Sydney is my home town.
We support the Sydney Swans, I can drive in Sydney without google maps, I could take tourists on awesome days out, I have close friends and family.
But while in Sydney, I didn't feel at home.
Yes, things felt familiar. It was comfortable. I knew backstreets and suburb names and saw people I knew in the streets. I knew the good coffee shops and the best places to eat and catch up with friends. I loved seeing my family. But I didn't feel at home.
Five months ago, I moved to Melbourne.
Melbourne is a place I have visited.
I follow the AFL, I can drive a 10 minute radius around my house without a GPS, I don't know where to recommend our visitors to go, I'm getting to know people.
But in Melbourne, I feel at home.
I feel at home but I don't feel comfortable. I miss my family. I'm with the one who I want to share my whole life with. My friendships are only 5 months old. Our house feels like ours. Our neighbourhood is foreign. I feel at peace and excited to be here. It is where we're meant to be.
Sydney is my home town.
We support the Sydney Swans, I can drive in Sydney without google maps, I could take tourists on awesome days out, I have close friends and family.
But while in Sydney, I didn't feel at home.
Yes, things felt familiar. It was comfortable. I knew backstreets and suburb names and saw people I knew in the streets. I knew the good coffee shops and the best places to eat and catch up with friends. I loved seeing my family. But I didn't feel at home.
Five months ago, I moved to Melbourne.
Melbourne is a place I have visited.
I follow the AFL, I can drive a 10 minute radius around my house without a GPS, I don't know where to recommend our visitors to go, I'm getting to know people.
But in Melbourne, I feel at home.
I feel at home but I don't feel comfortable. I miss my family. I'm with the one who I want to share my whole life with. My friendships are only 5 months old. Our house feels like ours. Our neighbourhood is foreign. I feel at peace and excited to be here. It is where we're meant to be.
In some ways, neither place feels like home.
"Home is where the heart is"
"Home is where your mum is"
"Home is wherever I'm with you"
But where is my true home? Where do I long to be? Where am I most comfortable, most vulnerable, most at peace, most fulfilled?
CS Lewis famously said,
I think I was made for another world.
I'm not moving to Mars or communist North Korea.
I don't want to be a dolphin or live in the trees.
The world I see is beyond my imagination, my thoughts, my dreams.
"What no eye has seen, what no ear has heard, and what no human mind has conceived." (1 Corinthians 2:9)
This world is my home.
And so I'm waiting and I'm longing to go home,
to the place that God has prepared for me.
I can't wait for that day.
But in the meantime, there's work to be done, joys to be shared and love to be given.
We are citizens of heaven living on earth. How are you going to use today?
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