It's about time your heart came home

Living from several suitcases for about 6 weeks has caused me to think a little about what home really means to me.

I'm talking about home...where you lay your head to sleep, or where you keep the night light on, or those home fires you tender, where you keep the fireplace embers burning on a cold chilly night.  

Don't we like to make our home spaces so comfy and familiar?  

A deeper thought though has hit my heart about home.  Where do you call home?

Is it where you sleep?  Where you eat or hang your hat?  Is it the place...where on a rainy day you can curl up with a good book on your favorite window seat and get lost on some distant pages that take you to a romantic journey of your dreams?  Is it four plain lonely walls that are hollow?

There are some families who will be missing a love this Thanksgiving.  So as you are gathering around your homey favorite traditional recipes, counting your blessings, think about those missing, so many empty chairs this holiday season.  They have gone Home before us.  

They made it Home first.

And that leads me to the truth that we are all on our journey Home, and someday death with come to greet us too.  Until God calls us Home, we continue to make nests of comfort here and there.  Making our spaces so favorite and pretty, too decorated, functional and cluttered.  

We make our homes pleasant, easy, and mostly dirt free.

I posed this question to two of my favorite little missionary friends.  They are two of the sweetest little helpers to their mom and dad, who are missionaries to Children's Cup in Swaziland, Africa.  They recently returned to Africa from a family furlough to the states.  

I asked them, "So coming back home to Africa after visiting your previous home in Minnesota, where is home to you?"  They both looked at each other, squirmed a little, thought and then offered an answer.

Their answer was so wise.  I didn't let on that God had just illuminated my light bulb in what He was trying to teach me in that moment, I just went on with our little friendly conversation.

Their answer?  "Africa."  Africa is their home.  They have spent more time in the states than they have in Africa, yet Africa was their home, as two young joyful voices explained it was because that's where their mom and dad were.  

I didn't need the explanation, I was busy listening to God.  At the same He said...  

Your home is where I AM.  

Home is where their parents are.  Of course it makes sense.  The very practical answer.  

My home is where my Father is.  Home is where my Father hangs out.  Home is where my Father calls me to be with Him.  My home is where there are no borders for my love and trust that is not defined by a destination, not held by four walls, or decorated with a fake faith.  My home is where contentment is found and love held dear.  Home is where I am honest and undone on the threshold of Holiness.  

Home is where I am held best.  Home is here...where I AM

Your home is where He is.  Home is where my soul bends low in love and worship.  Home is where my God is.  

Always.  Enough.  Here.

My home can be where I am, because my Father is always with me.  His Spirit dwells deep.

Yes, home is where my parent, my Father is found.  I like the cozy His presence brings my heart.  I hold my heart space dear for Him.

I think I'll let Him sift more now, to make even more openness, honesty, and softer places gentle.  There might be a few more corners to clean, seams to unravel, and shelves to rearrange making even more room for Him to burn and ignite.    

Schooch to the side..calendar and ticking clocks.  Shoo...you dust bunnies...move over now.

That's better, a bigger room with a view of God, now to unpack, stay a while and be content.

There's something about this space when He walks into a room....I am forever changed.

My heart is at home here where He is.

Monkeys, Haikus & Joy towards home

Avery gives me great joy

Avery wrote a Target Haiku.  For some reason when he and his mommy go to Target he thinks of me, his Grammy.  I don't know where he got that but I am loving that he does.

The miles between us create a distance that our hearts bridge.  It's hard for this little one to be away from his Grammy, just like it is for me.  

He gets such joy from the simple things like saying Haikus in the Target parking lot as he wants me to be near.

Take a look at this face...who wouldn't want to be near this?

Avery's Target Haiku

"Grammy misses me

It makes her so very sad

I love miss her too"

Avery is destined for greatness in the writing world or maybe just destined to enjoy life. 

While at his house recently, I ripped a page out of his little boy joy journal and took it to heart.  

You know friends, we only have today.  We are not guaranteed tomorrow.  We have hope of Heaven and that gives us our dreams of our eternal destination for sure.   But.... 

But what about today?  

Life of all kinds is looking up at you with some big blue eyes asking, "Will you dance with me?"  And more recently...when asked the question, I am stopping the whatever and pausing to soak in life.

It's not about how many emails I sent or didn't get.  It's not about the likes on Facebook for this blog, it's not about who retweets me because I just said the funniest 140 character quip about beets and bears.

It's about God and experiencing the life that He has given you.  Do you see that He personally serves us joy in so many ways for us?  That's the kind of Father we have that cares enough to not only create us, save us, secure a place in Heaven for us, but cares enough to provide joy around us and for us.

We are more than a number or a IP address.  We are those big-eyed wonders that sit at His knee and ask Him to dance with us.  He longs to give us joy.

I like knowing that I don't have to take a number or write an email to get a reply from God.  He tells me he loves me and cares every day, from the words He has already written.  

So knowing that I am loved gives me joy and I love to give joy and love to this little Target lovin' little man who misses me when I am not near.  May I encourage you today that your joy comes from Jesus and having a thankful perspective helps with the every day mundane, the piles of laundry, the dishes, the dirt, the messes, the spills and chills, the garbage that you find each and every day.  

As you stop and reflect about the life that God has given you today, just pause and thank him for the right things you see right now.  

Don't let what's wrong with you keep you from thanking and praising what's right with God.

See His blessings that hang out in life and want to be swung around the back yard like a monkey.

Need some ideas to get you started in your joy journey?  Take a mission trip to Africa.  Be a friend to someone who is alone.  Be kind to the person that just bit your head off at the gas station.  Let someone go first in traffic.  Be generous with the joy you have received, so much so that it is contagious.

Now that would be a movement to be joyful about.  Be grateful to someone for their kindness.  Compliment the next person you see, even if they irritate you.  

Most days you have to give it before you see God in it. 

It's about the lives God has blessed you with.   Life.  Joy moments like the monkey swings, and daddy's dances don't come often enough.   Experience the joy that God has planned for you today.

Have joy in the journey towards home.  

 

Music Monday [Where I Belong]

At Winter Jam there were some volunteers sporting yellow hard hats and t-shirts.  They were the street team for Building 429 helping to push their product, but it gave a construction zone feel to the place.  They came out on stage they sang their set, but the lyrics of Where I Belong really hit my heart.  

So when the walls come falling down on me
And when I'm lost in the current of a raging sea
I have this blessed assurance holding me.

Many times in construction zones, it gets really messy before it gets better.  There is pretty much a mess with materials and tools until the job is complete.  I often consider my life like a construction zone with God as the Master Planner.  He's got the blueprints and has designed me to obey and follow Him.  I often want to peek at the plans to see where we are headed.    One truth remains as I seek to follow and that is I am not "home" yet. 


Home is heaven and I have accepted His invitation to join Him in living my forever there.  That's where I belong.  So in this world that I live and in my home that I reside I have a blessed assurance that God is holding me and holding the plans for my tomorrows.  His assurance gives me comfort that this world is not a home that God created me for...He knew that I would just be passing through.  That's comforting, that helps.


In my construction zone of transformation, as I thrive to be more like Christ, there are a lot of twists, turns, walls being built, walls falling down.  The zone of change is quite active like a raging sea at times.  A lot of turmoil, a lot of trials, a lot of opportunities, a lot of impact.  But through it all, I have God's assurance...this is not where I belong.  Heaven is.  

Music Monday [Live Like That]

Thanks to Sidewalk Prophets 

for speaking the inner circle

prayer of every believer!  

Sometimes I think 
What will people say of me
When I'm only just a memory
When I'm home where my soul belongs

Was I love
When no one else would show up
Was I Jesus to the least of those
Was my worship more than just a song





(Chorus)
I want to live like that
And give it all I have
So that everything I say and do
Points to You
If love is who I am
Then this is where I stand
Recklessly abandoned
Never holding back
I want to live like that
I want to live like that

Am I proof
That You are who you say You are
That grace can really change a heart
Do I live like Your love is true

People pass
And even if they don't know my name
Is there evidence that I've been changed
When they see me, do they see You

Chorus
I want to live like that
I want to live like that

I want to show the world the love You gave for me
(I want to live like that)
I'm longing for the world to know the glory of the King 


My favorite line in this song is two words..."Recklessly abandoned".  I want to live with reckless abandonment to the cause of Christ.  I want everything I say and do to point to Him.  I want the world to see the Love you gave to me.  I want to reflect you Jesus.  That is my heart's cry.  

God you have changed my heart to reflect yours.  

May you always find your home in mine. 

Yes, I want to live like that.