Are you longing for home?

I have just finished our book club book 'In light of eternity - Perspectives on Heaven' by Randy Alcorn. What a life changing book!

It has been so exciting to read about our real Home, the one God is preparing for us.

Alcorn writes, "Like a bride's dream of sharing a home with her groom, our love for heaven should be overflowing and contagious, just as our love for God should be (Revelation 19:7). Our passion for God and our passion for heaven should be inseparable. The more I learn about God, the more excited I get about heaven. The more I learn about heaven the more excited I get about God.

How it must wound the heart of our bridegroom to see us clinging to this roach-infested hovel called earth, dreading the thought of leaving it, when he has hand built a magnificent estate for us, a place beautiful and wondrous beyond measure."

When we are blown away by an amazing sunrise or sunset, or marvel at great mountains and canyons we can praise God and 'these will prove to be but rough sketches of heaven'.

When we enjoy a night of sincere Christian fellowship it's only a glimpse of the deep rich, fellowship we will experience in heaven for an eternity.

When we take a bite of a fresh home grown tomato and delight in it's sweetness it's only a small taste of the food we will one day feast on in our everlasting home.

When we participate in an uplifting time of worship with our fellow believers that too is only a glimpse of what our worship will be like when we worship Him face to face with the entire body of Christ.

This earth is not our home! I am so thankful for the foretastes and glimpses He gives us of what is to come, and the dissatisfaction of worldly possessions and experiences remind me that deep inside I am longing for another place. A place where our bridge groom will be and where there will be no more tears because there will be nothing to be sad about.

"We spend our lives longing for this person and this place. Just as people restlessly move from relationship to relationship seeking the person they were made for, they move from location to location seeking the place they were made for. Somewhere new and better. A bigger house. A different city. The suburbs. A new neighbourhood - safer, nicer, with better schools. That dream house in the country. That idyllic mountain chalet. That perfect beach cottage.

Think about it - we have the very answers the world is crying out for, yet our wrong views of God's person and God's place silence and distort our message. What a triumph for Satan that we would actually pass on to our churches, our children, and our world a dreary view of heaven - and by implication a dreary view of God. "

Our view of eternity impacts everything we think, desire, say and do.

What a comfort....
To know that God and His saints are watching, cheering, praying for us.

To know that one day we will be rewarded for sincere, humble faithfulness to Him.

To know that one day we will be reunited with our friends and family, we will meet the faithful saints of the past, matyrs from oppressed countries, and millions of unborn children who will be dancing around heaven.

To know that God is preparing a place for each of us, unique and individual to us (I can't wait to see how God has decorated mine just for me!)

To know that one day we will meet Him face to face and He will wipe away every tear from our eyes, no more pain, suffering, and our deepest longings will be met in that place.

The greatest weakness of the western church today is arguably our failure to think of the long tomorrow - to take seriously the reality that heaven is our home. Out of this springs our love affair with this world and our failure to live now in the light of eternity.

I have been challenged to live so much more in the light of eternity. All I do, think, desire, say, spend, do has an impact for eternity. So expect me to be talking a whole lot more about our eternal home!

At the end of the day all that we have, our spouse, our children, our family, our possessions, our freedom, could all be stripped away from us, but what lasts forever is our eternal place in Heaven, and our eternal relationship with God.

God wants us to long for that place, to dream of it, to look up into the clouds and imagine His return. Thoughts of heaven will most certainly give us a dissatisfaction with this world, but it should also stir up a sense of urgency to tell others of a God that wants to spend eternity with them.
I will finish with some questions I was challenged by.

How about you? Are you following the example of the saints by longing for heaven (Hebrews 11:13-16; 2 Corinthians 5:2)?

Are you cultivating a passion for God's place?

Is heaven and all it represents a central object of your attention?

Have you 'set your heart on things above, where Christ is seated at the right hand of God' (Colossians 3:1)?

Is your heart's attention there, rather than on 'earthly things' (verse 2).

Therefore we do not lose heart. Even though our outward man is perishing, yet the inward man is being renewed day by day. For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:16-18