Where's Home?

Home is a safe place which belongs to you and to which you belong. I’ve been on a journey to find that safe place in recent days (or maybe years – I’m not really sure where I belong). I find myself in the company of mystics at times, believing that the journey inward is the one in which the divine is revealed and tranquility attained. The journey inward, for me, is a roller coaster ride into the belly of hell (at least when it’s ventured alone).  

I have often denounced the belief that truth can be obtained in abstraction given that revelation is highly relational. God reveals himself through interacting with persons and nations in history. God makes his dwelling on earth in the incarnation of Jesus Christ. I now know that my emphasis on the importance of church community however, remains an abstract truth rather than an experiential reality.  

Home is in the company of those with whom I already have acquaintance. Antithetical to home is the pursuit of those with whom I have yet to be acquainted. Home is the opposite of the pursuit of relationships in quantity and quality which will satisfy the longings for affirmation. Home is being satisfied, content, wholly complete in what has been provided, and thankful toward the one who has provided it. 

But again, home is that safe place. Home are the few Christian misfits who love Jesus, love their brothers and sisters and neighbors, yet still do not feel at home. Home is those few misfits who comfort, encourage, and strengthen me as much as I ever do them. 

Though I speak of the select few who “get me”, I would venture to say that if we took off the masks and were honest, very few of us feel at home. If we could be honest and vulnerable with each other, maybe we could begin to build a home together, and in this home we can live a hopeful exilic life.