You are Home to me.

Emma is on the left and, obviously, that's me on the right :)
This was in Portland last year in March over Spring Break.
We've spent a lot of valuable time together. ;)

A few months ago, sweet Emma was in South Africa. It was Thanksgiving and we were on the phone for an hour or so- her describing the millions of things our sweet Jesus had been teaching her on her 5 month journey through a few countries in Southern Africa. Fast forward to Christmas break while she was wrapping up her last few weeks in the country and she sent me this question:

"So is it okay to be homesick and ready to come home, but also not ready to come home?... I've come to the conclusion that I'm officially going crazy."

My response? "Welcome to my world." 

It is hard to have a wandering heart. It is hard to possess the ability to want to stay in a place you know and love for a long time. At the same time, my wandering heart is plagued with the ability to fall in love and want to stay in every place. So sleeping in my own bed just seems normal... but my own bed is not necessarily at the house I pay rent for. It's in a lot of places. When you've spent 18 years in one place-- for me a small town in Georgia- and you still call it home but you also spent 4 years away for college and called it (all 45 million of the places you live in college) home-- but you also have lived in the big city of Vegas for going on 9 years, you call it home. And you call everything in between home and there's a homesickness for all of those places. After that message from Emma, I sat down over a couple of days and wrote a poem that I felt identified my feelings for her and for me. But as I truly think about it, I think this could also so apply to adoption and foster care-- a safe place to call home. While this post is not entirely about adoption or foster care (as was my last), there are some identifying features that someone from that perspective could identify with. This was the prayer/poem I wrote in my journal...

Hey Jesus- There was one time when you became home to me. 
It wasn't a building, a pew, or a chair. 
It wasn't a city, state, or a country somewhere. 
It was You. Your heart. Your hands. Your mind. Your voice. So kind. 
It was sometimes my house, but sometimes not. 
It was my classroom, my car, a bunk bed in Zambia. 
It was a hotel room in D.C. and a dorm room in Tennessee.

Home became people. Who were priority.
It became the places You called me. 
Where my heart was a bit fearful
but beat faster. 
Where my mind was a little worried
but overly confident in Your breaking of impossible. 
Knowing You are. Above all things. In all things. Of all things. 
And all those things are you. 
And home is and was and will always be You. 

I penned those words during a prayer service and during my quiet time- just asking Jesus to show me Home. It is found in Him. The crazy and quiet. The solitude and chaos. The deep breaths and the loud screams. The giggles and the tears. The emotions when they make sense and don't.

How loved we are to be able to find our Home in a person who knows every.single.piece. of who we are and loves us through every.single.thing. Grateful for a home. That is loving and gracious and merciful and humble and true. One that doesn't fade through time. One that doesn't change with my emotions. 

My prayer is that Emma's hope for home will be found in the person of Jesus Christ. My prayer is that sweet girls and boys find their hope in a home centered around the person of Jesus Christ and they know Him. As home.

Jesus- thank you that you are still and always home to me. -Melis