Home, Sweet Home

” I got a home up in-a that Kingdom; ain't-a that good news?”

 A few weeks ago a friend of mine asked me to come to California to speak for some occasion. I was tempted, but declined his kind request. I told him I don’t travel much these days, seldom stray much beyond my own area code. My body ambled south some years ago, but that’s about as far in any direction I aim to go. These days I’m comfortable with myself right where I am. (Besides, my old dog has developed acute separation anxiety. Why should I cause her undue angst?)

Funny thing, though: Even though I’m safely ensconced I always feel a peculiar hankering to go home. C. S. Lewis called the feeling Sehnsucht, a German word that has overtones of nostalgia, and melancholic longing. There’s no word for it in English, but the feeling of being far from home is a fair approximation.

I’m homesick, I think, because my home lies elsewhere. God himself is my dwelling place (Psalm 90:1). He is my home, sweet home. That’s where my heart is these days.

To be “at home in the body” is to be absent from the Lord, Paul said (2 Corinthians 5:6), but someday soon I’ll be “at home with the Lord.” Then, my longing will be assuaged.

I certainly don’t deserve to dwell in house of the Lord forever, but Jesus made a way. If old friends ask me what I’m doing there, I’ll just point to my Big Brother. “I’m with him.” I’ll say. “Indeed,” Jesus will reply, “He’s family.”

Robert Frost said. “Home is the place where, when you go there, they have to take you in.”

Ain’t–a that good news?

DHR