Let’s Go Home

When you think of home what image comes to your mind? Some place that is warm, cozy and inviting, filled with all the things you hold dear. A place where you can entertain friends and share God's blessings? Or is home a spot on a sidewalk somewhere, or under a bridge, or maybe, a shelter. For many people right here in America, that's what home is.

Home may be a reflection of one's personality, and I daresay, one's pocket book. But whether it's a simple structure like the others in your neighborhood, a magnificent, custom-built mansion or a box on the sidewalk, it is just a shelter. Temporary. Here today, gone tomorrow.

I think of Jonah sitting under a tree to see what would happen to Nineveh after he had preached to them. And the Lord God prepared a plant and made it come up over Jonah, that it might be shade for his head to deliver him from his misery. So Jonah was very grateful for the plant. (Jonah 4:6). NKJV But this was only temporary, for God took it away.

For me, the word shelter brings up another image. A place where you take temporary cover from the rain, storm, or the heat of the sun. But the psalmist David speaks of another kind of shelter. For You have been a shelter for me, and a strong tower from the enemy. Ps 61.3

And again in Psalms 18:2, he speaks of a different kind of structure: The Lord is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer; My God, my strength, in whom I will trust; My shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold.

Here we get a picture of durability, strength, dependability. Something or Someone that can hide us from our enemies and deliver us. Something that will always be there for us. It cannot be moved. Only by putting our trust in God can we find this kind of protection. Whether you are fortunate to have a place you can call home, you still need the kind of security that only God can provide. You cannot find it on your own, or look to the government for it. Neither should we become unduly attached to it, for we know it is just a shelter, something temporary. Instead we should look to one day inheriting that permanent home that is reserved for the saints of God.

As Paul says, "For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens(2 Corinthians 5.1). He is

speaking of the body which will one day become permanent, immortal, incorruptible. That’s the type of home we need to build.

A Cry for Help

Many of you may have read the story of blind Bartimaeus who was healed of his blindness by Jesus. As the story goes, Jesus was passing through Jericho and when the blind man heard of it, he becan to cry out loudly, "Jesus, thou son of David, have mercy on me" (Mark 10:46). The people who were there tried to shut him up, but he cried out even louder. And we know what happens when we cry out to Jesus. He heard the man's cry, had Bartimaeus brought to him and He healed him. A happy ending.

Now my point is, what about those who are crying out day after day and no one hears them? I'm talking about children who have been abandoned by parents, those locked up in a prison cell, those who are dying of AIDS, hepatitis and other illnesses. The widows, orphans, poor, homeless, divorced right here in our society. And if we think of overseas, we have fields upon fields overflowing with grain ready to be harvested. Jesus said,"The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few; Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest" Matthew (9:37-38).

What are we doing about those silent cries that go unheard? Are they our responsibility? Jesus said, "For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me ... Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me" (Matthew 25: 35-36, 40).

Let's not ignore these cries for help all around us. Jesus didn't, and He commissioned us to do as He did. Will you pray for God's leading to help you hear and answer the cries of those less fortunate than ourselves?