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WHERE DO

I BELONG?

Okay! Here’s the thing:

You live 25 years, within 5 miles of the general area where you were born. You move 500 miles away and live there for 5 years.

Then you move to within 2 hours of your home and snuggle in to an area and people among which you feel very comfortable. Your child grows up there. You help people tie their knots, bury their dead and deal with the many frustrations of life for ten years of your life.

Then you move some three hundred miles away and involve yourself in the lives of people you grow to know and care about. Their children grow up and have children. A number of the older people are smitten by the great enemy death. So, as best you can, you try to help them live their lives and deal with the joys and heartaches of life.

The next thing you know 25 years have gone by like a bullet. You realize that you are not at all young any more. You and your love of 51 years are living on the back edge of life. Like many of those you have followed, you begin to ask yourself,  

EXACTLY WHERE

There is a story in Genesis about a particular son of the  family of Terah. Here was a family that lived together and traveled together. They decided to move in the direction of Haran and to do so together. The Ur of the Chaldeans was the land of their nativity.

Many of the early impressions of their lives came from the time lived there. This is where they started their families. There was comfort to be had in neighbors and friends as well as familiarity of the area. The weather patterns became like a clock.

A brother died and was buried there. From the land of his (Abram’s) nativity, where he lost his brother to the enemy death, he moved his family to the land of Haran, where he lost his father to death.


Abram took Lot his brother’s son, his nephew, with him on his journey into the land of Canaan. He became like a wondering alien. We are told in the New Testament that they confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. Hebrews 11:13 I should think they were asking themselves the same question I often ask myself:

 
  • WHERE EXACTLY DO I BELONG? IF I WERE TO RETIRE, WHERE WOULD IT BE? WHERE WOULD I FEEL MOST COMFORTABLE LIVING OUT THE REMAINDER OF MY YEARS?

As he looked around listening to the leadership of God, Abram believed there must be something better. So he was always looking for a better country. Hebrews 11:16. He was looking for a city which has foundations whose architect and builder was God. Heb. 11:10

AMERICA

America is a beautiful country. The freedoms and opportunities we enjoy here to the degree we have them are not enjoyed anywhere else in the world. However, with all our freedoms and opportunities, why are we killing one another, cursing one another, and living like animals? Folks, there is bound to be something better.

So I’m still looking. Sad to say, our cities might look beautiful from an airplane or from some vantage point outside the city but when you start to look within and find all the greed, hatred, corruption it is easy to become discouraged. Is God still allowed in our cities and for that matter in our country?

Only if you keep it quiet. Yes, for the moment we can have our God within the confines of our church walls, our homes  and even on tv, radio, and the internet; yes, for the time being. There is nothing that can keep us from allowing God into our hearts and minds.

Folks, there is bound to be something better. A better city. A better country. No doubt, this (America) is the best there is in this world today. So far as this world is concerned “it don’t get no better than this”. But there is coming and notice I did say coming, a country (the Kingdom of God) Matthew 6:10 and a city (New Jerusalem). Revelation 21:2.

That's what Abram looked for. Do you suppose, with the information he had, he expected around every bend and over every mountain he expected to find that country. He expected to see that city. He traveled in the very vicinity of that country and of that city but never inherited so much as a foot of ground. Not so much as a foot of the ground God had promised to give to him. Genesis 13:14-15 Yet his God had promised him that he would give it to him as a possession. Acts 7:5.

So, by faith Abraham is my father (Galatians 3:7-9) and I am set to inherit that same blessing and that same land that he died without receiving. I am set to be a citizen of that country as well as a citizen of that city.

So I have found where I belong. I know that here I do not have a lasting city, (Hebrews 13:14) but I am looking for one to come. No, not a city I am going to but a city which is to come. Oh yes, my inheritance is reserved in heaven now. I Peter 1:4. But Jesus will bring that reward with him when he comes. Revelation 22:12 I am anticipating the grand celebration when

 

  • They will come from the east and the west and from north and south, and will recline at the table in the kingdom of God. Abraham, Isaac and all the prophets will be there to celebrate their inheritance.   Luke 13:28-29.
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