Remember the movie “E.T.”? (I didn’t like it myself, but … ) E.T. was this grotesque little alien dude that some people found cute. When the spaceship full of his buddies took off, E.T. somehow got left behind. Over the coming days, E.T. found some great friends, had some fun, and found at least one person who loved him—maybe a whole group of people who loved him. Not only that, but he loved them, enough to be willing to give his life for them.

That’s a great thing to have: people who love you that much and people you love that much. But what as E.T.’s one great desire? Where did he want to go more than anywhere (or anything) else?

Home.

Why? As good as he had it here (aside from people trying to kill him, of course), this place was not his home. This planet became a pretty good temporary stop with some wonderful friends, but it was not his home.

You know what? This isn’t your home, either.

Let me read you a story about a guy who knew where home was:

Hebrews 11:8-16
It was faith that made Abraham obey when God called him to go out to a country which God had promised to give him. He left his own country without knowing where he was going. By faith he lived as a foreigner in the country that God had promised him. He lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who received the same promise from God. For Abraham was waiting for the city which God has designed and built, the city with permanent foundations. It was faith that made Abraham able to become a father, even though he was too old and Sarah herself could not have children. He trusted God to keep his promise. Though Abraham was practically dead, from this one man came as many descendants as there are stars in the sky, as many as the numberless grains of sand on the seashore. It was in faith that all these persons died. They did not receive the things God had promised, but from a long way off they saw them and welcomed them, and admitted openly that they were foreigners and refugees on earth. Those who say such things make it clear that they are looking for a country of their own. They did not keep thinking about the country they had left; if they had, they would have had the chance to return. Instead, it was a better country they longed for, the heavenly country. And so God is not ashamed for them to call him their God, because he has prepared a city for them. (GNB)

Maybe Dumas is your dream place to live. If it’s not, where do you dream of? If you could just retire to anywhere, where would it be? A log cabin in the mountains? A house on a beach? Maybe a fancy apartment overlooking Central Park in NYC.

Most of us have a dream along those lines. And sometimes we let the thought germinate, “If I could just live there, in that kind of place, I’d be set. No more worries.”

My brother-in-law Ed could have told us something about that. For the last few years of his life, Ed worked for a maintenance company in Estes Park, CO. They did heating and air and plumbing and all those things. Many of their clients were people who had “made it”. They had retired from a lucrative position somewhere else and come to the beautiful mountain town of EP. Some of them hadn’t retired, yet, but they had already bought the house. Ed’s job was sometimes to go up before the owners came on the weekend and get the plumbing in order. Or, the last time the owner had been there the house had seemed too cold so Ed went out and checked the heater, doing whatever repairs were necessary.

Expensive houses, beautiful setting, and still things went wrong. Ed also led the singing at his church there in EP. And one time he was telling me about what a strange congregation it was, compared to what he was used to, anyway. Many of the families in the congregation were blended families (for more than in any other church he had been a part of). See, the people had worked so hard during their first marriage to be able to afford EP, that by the time they could afford it their marriage had crumbled (due to the fact that they spent so much time and effort at work and away from their families). So they had all these families who had one set of kids with them, but the Dad had another set of kids that lived somewhere else and the Mom and another set of kids who lived somewhere else, and they were struggling to raise their “new” little kids in the stable home their older kids hadn’t had the benefit of while still trying to reach out and love their older kids. [Follow me on this?]

In other words, even living in your dream town is not always paradise.

You know why that is? Because God loves you.

Psalm 23:6b
And I shall dwell in the house of the LORD forever. (ESV)

Remember the bag I told you to hug marked “loneliness”? That loneliness that was actually a gift from God because it reminded you that only in God would you find the love and compassion you crave?

Here’s another weird bag: homesickness.

Have you ever been homesick?

I remember being homesick. It was my freshman year at college. Dallas Christian College. Great place. Friendly place. But I missed my home.
Homesickness is hard to deal with, but it’s a great gift. See, I like my house here in Dumas. When Martha and I moved in, some of you will remember that we did some work on it. Lots of painting; new appliances (just because the old ones were fire hazards!), stuff like that. And since then, we have continued to do some work here and there. There’s more we would like to do.

Still, what would you think of someone who went to all the trouble to repaint their section of a Greyhound Bus? What about a guy who carries a king-size bed and a side table with a lamp onto an airplane? Lot of trouble to go to for temporary quarters, right?

The stuff we’re doing for our house is a lot of work for temporary quarters. Some of it we did because we had to to live there (like the appliances); some of it we did because it would make our stay there more pleasant (like the paint); but all of it is temporary. I hope it’s my home for a long time, but however long it is, it’s just going to be my temporary home. If I follow my grandfather and live to be 96, and if I live the rest of my earthly life in that house (which would mean being there for 55 years!), it’d still just be my temporary home.

So why go to all the work? Especially that work that could be deemed unnecessary?

See, the reason I’m not satisfied with my house is because it’s not really my home. I will probably keep trying to make it a little better, but the reality is that my heart was wired with a very specific desire for a home and I will never quite be able to make this house—or any earthly house—live up to that desire.

That’s a good thing!

Psalm 139:13
You created every part of me; you put me together in my mother's womb. (GNB)

Mind if I reference another science fiction movie that wasn’t very good? In “Star Trek: The Motion Sickness” … I mean “Picture”, there’s this giant cloud moving through space and destroying worlds and immobilizing ships and just generally wreaking havoc. It is, of course, up to Captain Kirk to stop it. When he tries, he finds that at the center of the cloud there is an old NASA space probe. It was launched from earth 200+ years before with the instructions that it “learn all that is learnable and return to the creator.”

God created us with a desire to find him.

If you don’t feel at home in this world, that’s because this world isn’t your home.

John 14:2-4
There is plenty of room for you in my Father's home. If that weren't so, would I have told you that I'm on my way to get a room ready for you? And if I'm on my way to get your room ready, I'll come back and get you so you can live where I live. And you already know the road I'm taking. (MSG)

What do I DO with this?

Put your heart where your real treasure is. Stop trying to find your fulfillment in this life. You can’t. You weren’t made to. You were made to come home.

And remember the words of Walt Kelly, “Don’t take life too serious, it ain’t no how permanent.”

Comments? Email me at npccsam@windstream.net