I just want to go home. I just want to be home.
... and I was desperate to return home. I just wanted to be home.
When I am travelling, I always long for home. My pillow. My bed. My coffee mugs. My chair.
Familiar sights and sounds. Familiar faces. Familiar schedule. Familiar food.
I was desperate for home.
And yet, ... I am home now. I am here! I have been home now for three days and I have again that post-travel, not-uncommon discontent feeling. It lingers. The discontent isn't extreme. I am truly happy to be home and to sleep in my ever-comfy bed. But, as I often quickly realize when returning home, I am not really home. Not really.
What is it that I long for?
What I really long for is that "other country" that we read about in Hebrews 11. What I really long for is that heavenly country, that perfect home.
When I am away, somewhere in my mind my earthly home becomes "more perfect" than reality. My insatiable longing for "home" reaches far beyond what my earthly home can provide. Because, when I come home... I have dirty clothes to clean and sickness with which to contend. I have jet-lag and a bed that won't ever promise a full nights rest... I have meals to cook, school to teach, hard people to deal with, and well, life. Real, sin-bathed, sometimes tiring life.
As beautiful as my home is... and, it is beautiful! As happy as it is, ... and it is happy! As blessed as I am on this earth and in my earthly dwelling, ... and I am richly blessed!! Still...it is not my home. Not really.
This lingering discontent reminds me that I am a "stranger in this country" and that what I really long for is heaven. I long for that perfect, no-tears, no sickness place. I long for eternity. I long for the Rest of God. Hebrews 11 tells me, I am not alone in this longing. They, too, wanted to go home. They knew they lived in tents on this earth.
So, I still long. And, sometimes I feel desperate for home and I just want to go home.
