"Sam, where is home?" I asked him. The tears left mascara tracks to my chin, finishing in perfect ombre on the tile underfoot. Splat, splat. I never realized how much I took the stability and unity of my former life for granted.
We'd just hung up the phone with our Brooks and Evelyn Rose, receiving the ten million kisses gifted via a metal and plastic covered cellular device. I'm missing the warmth of their pink lips. The chubby fingers holding my face to theirs. I even miss the "closing of the door" tantrum that generally follows this kissing routine. I miss my family, my home.
These two now live 45 minutes away from me, the other lives behind 3/8" of Plexiglas across the street. Our house and (nearly) all our earthly belongings live an ocean away. What we couldn't bring with us for our cross continental move two years ago lies scattered with family and friends around North Carolina. Our friends are as close as these hospital hall, as far as Italy, where we were meant to be for a wedding in a little over a week. We are, in the very literal sense, a household divided.
When I was about 12, my mom had a Mary Engelbreit calendar with quotes and illustrations to match. One in particular always stuck out to me; the one with a doe eyed girl looking straight at me, arms wrapped lovingly around her little brother. "Oh," she says, "we have a home, we just don't have a house to put it in." That little depiction always left me with chills. Materials are immaterial. It's your family that matters. It's family that gives you a resting place. But where does this leave us now, me and my Sam? We have a house, we just don't have a home to put in it. We have each other, and I am so, so grateful for that. But our babies? How can we rest when we are apart this way? What message are we sending them through our absence? Do they still know how much we adore them? Do they know how much they are loved?
There's a passage in Luke about home. I never really got it before, but all these questions nudged me to reread it. Here it is:
“As they were going along the road, someone said to him, “I will go wherever you go.” And Jesus said to him, “Foxes have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay his head.” To another he said, “follow me,” But he said, “Lord, let me first go and bury my father.” And Jesus said to him, “Leave the to dead bury their own dead, but as for you, go and proclaim the Kingdom of God.” Yet another said, “I will follow you, Lord, but let me first say farewell to those at my home.” Jesus said to him, “No one who puts his hand to the plow and looks back is fit for the kingdom of God.”
At first glimpse, or, in my case, first 100 glimpses, Jesus seems so harsh in his responses. I've always thought that the Jesus in this vignette isn't a very likable one. I know I'm not supposed to feel that way, but I just couldn't understand how Jesus could treat these men with such seeming indifference and heartlessness. Reading this again in my current situation, I saw a different picture. (P.S. I know there is a deeper exegesis than what I'm offering here, but I'll leave all the formal stuff for those smarty pants educated and knowledgeable enough to do it accurately. Sam.)
When Jesus is approached by a man promising to follow him anywhere, Jesus' response doesn't inspire confidence. He states His own homelessness in no uncertain terms. Jesus, Son of God, has humbled Himself so low that, even from His very birth, He has not the security even of a bed. Jesus, fully God and fully man, leaves the eternity of heaven to become the ultimate nomad. "Are you ready to sign up for that?" he seems to ask this fellow. "Look before you leap. . ." I read here a reassurance, too, a reassurance that He understands the precariousness and even the grief that comes with living in the temporary. All of us--even God Himself--we're all nomads here. "The way you suffer, I suffer, too" He says.
The next man asks to bury his father, and Jesus' response had me stumped and mildly offended for years. (Here's another great thing about God: He isn't too bothered when I'm bothered by His word. And, even better, He doesn't change His word based on my opinion of it. I am so, so thankful for His constancy and wisdom!) This time reading the passage, I was struck by something I never saw before: Jesus isn't being heartless here. Jesus is offering hope to the wallowing, bestowing purpose to the aimless, offering anticipated life where there was only foreseen death. What a gift He extends to this man! What grace He offers!
The final man really resonated with me in my homesick state. "Just let me say 'Goodbye?'"And Jesus answers. His answer isn't the harsh unfeeling one that I once read there; Jesus is speaking compassion. "When you look behind, you can't see what's in front of you." When I look to the past as ultimate goal, I miss the gift of what's next, and the greater gift of the One leading me forward. Viewing the past with nostalgia isn't wrong, but straining to see behind and pining for once was won't heal the wounds of what is. Just as "what ifs" for the future can be damaging, so, too, can be "what ifs" for the past.
So I'll walk forward. I'm not hoping for what I left behind, but something new. Something better.
". . . Forgetting those things that are behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." (Phillipians 3:13-14)