Every Sunday we gather around our holy Book of many books. We explore its literary genres and varied voices, its timeless truths and limitless questions. Its themes and topics are countless, of course, but I’m convinced that, through all the grand tales and small moments, through all the poetry and wisdom and even legalese, there moves a recurring idea. Or is it a memory or dream or vision? I only know it’s a place and so much more than a place. It’s home.
That’s a big word of four letters—home. It is the place of safety and sometimes fear, nostalgia and a few ghosts, but in the Bible, it seems to me, it is the place forever sought, and, in moments divine or even surprising, sometimes found.
Eden? Home and home lost. Egypt, home and prison escaped. Canaan, the Promised Land? Home given. Home claimed. Home lost again. And then to those people mourning that home, exiled in a strange land, the prophet Jeremiah said, “Settle in; make this strange place home. Remember who you are and live.” Home redefined.
And then, the return. Jerusalem and the Temple rebuilt. Home again. Then home conquered by outsiders. What is this home that is ours but isn’t? Where is home now?
Into this world of home-shoppers came Jesus, born in a strange place surrounded by animals; a refugee in Egypt; at home in the nurture of Nazareth, only to be rejected by his neighbors. He pitched his tent among us, with no place to lay his head. Then he dared to say, “Come to me; abide in me.” Home? Home. Our home is with and in the one who embraces sinners and invites outsiders.
He brings us together in his body, the church.
Ah! The church! Is the church home? I long to call it that—a place of safety for our children, a place of acceptance for you and me, a place where we can grow and stretch. Of course it’s home, right? Unless it isn’t, unless you’re the outsider who feels unwelcomed or the one who grew among us and now feels dismissed. Like all the other places we call home, it is and isn’t quite.
But maybe the church is the place where we practice for the home we await. The Bible describes that promised home as the heavenly city, built on the shores of the River of Life, the long-lost tree its shade and Christ its light. It’s the place of grace and peace. And it’s still under divine construction. Only when God once and for all throws open the doors of welcome will we know and share the fullness of home.
And so, we practice by making the church as safe as we possibly can for any who dream of home, for any who feel lost out there, and for any who, weary from their labors, long for rest. We practice for the home God is building by furnishing our church now with the love of Jesus, whose welcome and embrace know no limits.
And when the place starts to blend in a little too comfortably with the neighborhood, we look once more to the Book, and we remind ourselves of the Savior in whom we abide and the place God is preparing. And we practice some more. On our way home, there is home to be found together.
You, Me, Some Words 
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