Those who cherish hearth and home no doubt found the above paragraphs very sad. Well, weep for me if you must, but I will not weep with you. My days of weeping are over.
Can you make peace with the sorrow of life? If not, you cannot fully know what joy is -- for light is most clearly visible where there is contrasting darkness. Nor can you make peace with your true self, for sorrow is an inherent part of it. I have been a few times to online chat rooms for Abuse Survivors, and found those rooms full of pathologically self-absorbed people. Those people were stuck on their painful memories, unable to move beyond. But had they been ready, they would have seen the solution easily: simply resolve in your mind that none of the horrors of the past need prevent you from being happy here and now. No, I cannot recover the happy childhood I never had; but, no longer a child, I can choose to be a happy adult. If you say to me, "it's not that simple," my only reply will be, "you are not ready yet; when you are ready, you will see that it is that simple." I, too, have known bitterness and anguish.
But the things we have been discussion -- disillusionment with human cultures and detatchment from place -- have sound thology behind them, although I did not realize it at the time. Consider what Christ said was the price of following Him: "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters -- yes, even his own life -- he cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26). By "hate," it is clear that He meant to put them a distant second; that given the choice between any of them and Christ, I will pick Christ every time. To many people, putting them second to Christ will feel like hate. That sounds harsh to the ears of a person of this world -- especially to one in the "family values" movement, which tries to say that family is something sacred -- but a Christian can be no other way. And consider Christ's response when a man offered to follow Him: he dissuaded the man, saying, "Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head" (Luke 9:58). Think about that statement for a moment. Christ has just told us that he was what nowadays would be called a homeless person. Christ was homeless -- He slept in gardens, or in "lonely places," or in the houses of whomever invited Him in. And He had already shown that "no prophet is accepted in his hometown" (Luke 4:24), by being rejected there. Christ was a Vagabond. And as one who seeks to be like Christ, I am not ashamed to share in that label.
I am by no means the first to discover this truth. The annals of history are full of the faithful who lived as not of this world. Indeed, Christian missionary Kosuke Koyama, in his Waterbuffalo Theology, wrote entire chapters on the concept of "spiritual homelessness."
What does it mean to be spiritually homeless? Simply this: to recognize that (in the words of Christian singer Jaci Velasquez), "this spinning world is not my home." You may hold earthly title to a house or a piece of land, but that is of the perishing earth, and means nothing in the end. I knew a woman once whose house burned to the ground. Thankfully, no one was inside at the time, but every thing was a loss. After searching through the ashes and rubble, she managed to find one memento of each of her children -- and that was all. She was still able to praise the Lord. If you were in her shoes, how long would it take you to be at peace in your heart? How attached are you to the things of this present earth?
One of the most beautiful teachings on the life of faith -- and a recurring theme in my devotional life -- is found in the book of Hebrews. Chapter 11 speaks of Abraham:
By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later recieve... obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob.... For he was looking forward to the city with foundations, whose architect and builder is God (Hebrews 11:8-10).After leaving his fatherland, Abraham remained a nomad for the rest of his earthly life; the only land he ever owned was his burial plot (see Genesis 23). Hebrews says he "obeyed and went, eventhough he did not know where he was going." How many of today's faithful have that kind of faith? The key is not to be attached to an earthly home; as Hebrews goes on to say:
[The faithful] admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth. People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. Instead, they were longing for a better country -- a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them (Hebrews 11:13-16).Key words in this passage are, "aliens and strangers on earth." Becoming an alien (literally, alienation) is the opposite of becoming a citizen. It is to reject, or to be rejected by, one's native country -- and thus, to become homeless. If the faithful are "aliens...on earth," then we are by definition homeless. Even if you hold title to a house, it is only a temporary residence.
Unlike Abraham, I do not hold title to a burial plot. Nor do I own a tombstone. Why should I? My Lord Jesus never owned either of these things; He was buried in a borrowed tomb, by the generosity of another man. I know not when or where Death may overtake me, nor do I care. When I leave this body, do not waste resources shipping it "home," for I acknowledge none. Bury me where I fall. Or, if that is not possible, then bury me in the nearest Christian burial ground. And if, through the generosity of another, I should be supplied with a tombstone, then let it read simply, in the local language of the region:
Hebrews 11:14-16
Here the journey ended
