This will be a relatively short post, I just wanted to let others know about what God taught me this morning, I’m hoping that current racers will read it and be encouraged, but I also hope that somehow, you, the reader, even if you aren’t a racer can find a nugget of truth for yourself this afternoon.
Devotions were led by Chelsea, my teammates and she shared 2 Peter 4:1-2, which talks a little bit about the suffering of Christ and then tells us that if we suffer in the flesh we will no longer be suffering in sin, but the part that I want to talk about came from a fellow racer Richard and also Chelsea combined. Rich talked about how Christ came down from heaven, his perfect home and dwelt among us, posing the question, “do you think it would be easier to leave that perfection to come to an inherently evil place, or to just see a glimpse of what heaven would be like and then have to anxiously wait for many years to actually experience it?” Chelsea mentioned something about missing home and the difficulties of that, and something struck me.
Yes, I am homesick.
But you know what else?
My home, as lovely and as awesome as my family and loved ones are (and I will be the first to admit that God has blessed me richly with an awesome family, Godly parents, and an amazing future wife) is still a fallible place. My family still screws up sometimes. We say things we don’t necessarily mean and we don’t always love like God.
When Jesus Christ left heaven, he left a home of perfect love. Love that never fails, never gives up, never demeans, never misspeaks, always builds up, never gives up and is in every way, shape and form completely and utterly perfect. Jesus left all that, as the John 1:14 in the Message says, to “move into the neighborhood” of a nasty, evil, self-seeking world where people were sure to reject him and hate him. And he left for 33 years! It puts a whole new perspective on 11 months for me. After this, my homesickness is infinitely incomparable to the homesickness that Jesus must have felt every moment of every day for his entire life.
This hit me hard this morning because the person who I am entrusting my life to everyday knows my every pain and then immeasurably more than that. He totally understands my homesickness, and to me, having a leader that understands me completely makes me only want to follow him that much more; to give my life completely to him. To make the most of this opportunity that although brings homesickness, also brings situations to share the love of Christ that is coursing through my veins. So I charge you, Racers, when feelings of homesickness come, the God that has called you here, knows exactly what you are feeling—press into his love, the love that is more perfect than any love that could come from our earthly homes.
