It finally looks like the Ireland I always dreamed it would
be…rain falling in sheets against a misty mountain background. Being inside on
a day like this feels like home.
But it’s not home. And I miss home: the way the rain pitter
patters on our roof, little puppies everywhere (yes, my parents bought three
dogs this year…), seeing my Dad’s happy face and goofy laugh and hearing my
mom’s voice and feeling her hugs.
It’s not home…but it is.
I grew up a long time ago. I wasn’t one of those who wanted
desperately to move away from home (I was literally petrified to do it) but I
got the chance. And once I tasted freedom (well, maybe just living in dorms
where friends were right outside the door) I never wanted to go back. I did
enjoy coming home, but it was okay to be on my own. Jesus and I, we could
handle it.
The same pattern continued those years of college, student
teaching, being a nanny. Then a lot changed really quickly and I was back home
for a year, just a year, and then a job came along. I started to live about
forty-five minutes from my parents’, visiting whenever I felt like it. The
nearness was good and I often commented to my mom, “You’re lucky to have had me
for this long.” I thought for sure I would land on the mission field straight
away. God had other (good) plans.
And now Northern Ireland. I can’t just jump in a car and
drive over to my mom and dad’s, there are no puppy piles possible with them
across an ocean and a continent: life is very different, far from home. I am
fully immersed in a beautiful community, with its own struggles and joys, all
bound up together and fully aware that life goes on back in California, without
me.
I’m reading the Cost of Discipleship this week and it’s
literally the perfect book for the season I am in. I know this is where God has
me and He wants all the best for me and He is being so good to me. But that
doesn’t mean I didn’t have to leave behind people and things I love, more than
I ever knew I could love. I…
I’m going to stop there. You know how I feel (or you don’t)
and that’s fine. You have your own rant to let out, hearing mine might just add
to your burden in a way I don’t intend. We all live displaced, one way or
another, at some point in our lives, whether we find ourselves going away from
all that is safe for a job or school, marrying someone and leaving all you know
or being torn out of your safety by a war raiding your homeland. I don’t care
how it is done or to what degree: it’s what you do with it.
A book called Compassion by talks about this very thing:
that we all find ourselves displaced and that is where we meet and relate to
Jesus, the ultimate one who was displaced. He left heaven to be one of us on
earth: I can’t imagine a great humiliation or change of life styles. To be born
in a manger…
But a deep love overtook Him. He saw—it says so in
Hebrews—what the cross would bring to Him and He was willing to endure to the
end to see us all the way through, to heaven and home. The thought of it
comforts me as I face my struggles and see myself through all the ways I am
weak: Jesus knows. His love was poured out perfectly so that I might be one
with Him. He won’t leave me in this struggle or even take a step back. He is
for me completely.
So I walk forward unashamed, entrusting myself to Him
completely. We leave for India in a month, what a glorious unknown!
But to be with Jesus: that is always home. Remember that,
wherever you are and whatever you are facing: Jesus is near and His comfort
leaves no room for doubt. Abandon yourself to Him completely and see if He
won’t fill you…
See if He won’t…
Thank you, Go, for taking good care of my girl. She is at home, no matter where in our world, when you are holding her. Thank you for growing her up and moving her closer to you. Hug her for me tonight.
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