When anyone ever asks me where I’m from, I start to get really awkward because I don’t really know what to say. Honestly, I’ve lost count of how many places I’ve lived - I think I’m up to 12 places?! And no place has ever felt like home. I can’t tell you how jealous I am of the people who have been friends with their best friend since kindergarten or who have memories of being a kid in their same house when they come home to see their parents. I don’t have anything like that. I’ve always felt like a gypsy.

And with the gypsy life also comes no sports loyalty. How can you root for the home team if you’ve never had a home?! But all that changed when I decided to get my Masters degree from Duke University. I decided that I was going to call the Blue Devils my home team (and yes, that is all sorts of ironic to root for the Blue Devils while studying theology!). 

One evening while I was having a drink at Tennessee Brewworks, my “home” team was playing basketball against their biggest rival on the TV (and I’m such a fan that this took me by surprise and I had no idea they were playing beforehand…). The game was amazing. There were so many last-second three-pointers (is that the right term?!) and it came down to overtime where Duke scored another three points as the clock hit zero to win. I was hooping and hollering, standing from my seat, so excited to be rooting for the team that had just played an incredible game. I was so into it, that even after the game, the employees came over to me and asked me if it was OK to change the channel. I graciously and magnanimously told them that was OK. 

For a small moment, I finally felt what it was like to have a home. I felt like I had a connection to something bigger than myself. I felt like I had loyalty. I felt like I had camaraderie with the community of fans who were watching the game. I felt like I belonged. 

And that small moment of feeling like I belonged is what I hold onto when I think of what all eternity will feel like, because that is what God’s presence brings us—a home. Psalm 68 tells us that God gives those who feel lost or empty or abandoned a place to call home. God is a parent-figure to those who have no parents. God is a protector to those who have no protection. God is the mother-hen who lets her chicks nestle up to her warm feathers and protects them from danger.

...that is what God’s presence brings us—a home.

We all have a need to belong. But so often, the world can make us feel like we don’t belong. Sometimes we feel like no one understands us. Sometimes we are abandoned by those who were supposed to protect us. Some of us have been deeply betrayed by the ones we love. And sometimes, we just feel like the odd-one-out while everyone else has a place to belong. 

No matter where you find yourself today, know that you have a place in God’s home. And I can’t wait to live there with you forever.

Let's pray: Holy God, Thank you for loving us so much that your presence gives us a home. Help us to be reminded of that home today as we hold onto the hope of having that home for eternity. Amen.

Reflect: Have you ever experienced finding home in prayer with God? How can you cultivate this sense of home now? Can you make a sacred space in your home? Carry something to remind you of your eternal home?

If you follow me on social media, you may have seen that I was in the desert of Arizona on vacation this past week. At first, I was so taken aback by the terrain. There was obviously no grass, and I wasn’t used to the landscape being so sparse with tan dirt and quartz rocks everywhere. The special part about the desert I was in was that we were surrounded by saguaro cacti—the kind of cacti you see pictured with the two arms that are so popular — which are only found in the Sonoran desert and cannot live anywhere else. I had no idea these cacti were so rare. I thought they must have been all over the west! But nope, only in this special region.** 

What was so precious to me about these cacti is that they need a nursing tree with shade in order to grow. Without their nursing tree, they won’t survive. The most common nursing tree in the area was the velvet mesquite tree. And this isn’t just any tree. The mesquite tree has a root system that reaches down in the ground up to 180 ft to reach the water bed so that the tree can survive in the desert. The mesquite tree has no need for the saguaro cactus nor is it adversely affected by it, the mesquite tree simply stands tall and gives life to other plants.

Staring at this nursing tree in the middle of the desert reminded me of the hemorrhaging woman in Luke 8. Scripture tells us that this woman had been bleeding for 12 years and spent all her money seeking out doctor after doctor, searching far and wide for help to no avail (Mark 5:26). 

In Luke 8 we find her in a huge crowd, making her way toward Jesus. She must have been pushed and tossed around by the mob scene, but nevertheless she found her way to Jesus, touched him, and was immediately healed. 

We don’t know much about this woman’s religious knowledge, but I doubt she sat around debating the validity of infant baptism, the nuances of predestination, or possible tribulation theories. All we know is that she had the right kind of knowledge—the knowledge that proximity to Jesus changes lives. Her faith told her that if she could just get close to Jesus, if she could just grasp his robe, her life would never be the same. 

And if we have that same faith, if we make it our top priority to be close to Jesus, our lives will never be the same either. Like the saguaro cactus needs the velvet mesquite tree close by in order to provide shade so it can flourish, we need Jesus close by so that we can flourish. And like the baby Saguaro cactus needs to be by a living tree that has its roots 180 ft deep in the waterbed to grow, we need to be by Jesus, who tells us he is the source of living water (John 4:14).

If you want to know what this Christian life is all about, it’s all about being close to Jesus. And this isn’t just a Sunday school closeness or a mission trip closeness, this is a lifelong closeness, an everyday closeness, a closeness that’s not a job, but a closeness we can’t resist.

If you want to know what this Christian life is all about, it’s all about being close to Jesus.

Some of us are skeptical about Christianity because we’ve been burned by the church or the Christians we know seem to cause more harm than good, and if this is you, I want to encourage you to turn your focus to Jesus. Ignore those who are caught up in petty debates or lists of don’ts and simply draw close to Jesus. Read about Jesus’ life in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Grasp tightly to the robe of Jesus and watch as Jesus heals the blind, stands up for the poor, forgives after being crucified, and restores those who reject him. 

As you stand close to Jesus, your life will be transformed. Your wounds will heal. Your trauma will be redeemed. You‘ll start to look different because you’ll look like Jesus. You’ll be clothed in Christ. Before you know it, your words will heal. You’ll help others see redemption. And you will catch a glimpse of the Kingdom to come.

Let’s pray: Jesus, we ask that you give us the desire to come close to you. Teach us how to look like you, how to act like you, and how to love like you. Amen.

Reflect: What are the attributes of Jesus that make you want to be close to Jesus? 

**All cacti/tree knowledge is passed down in the oral tradition from my naturalist instructor, Marcia, from Tanque Verde Ranch.
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This past week I had the privilege of attending a debut album recording for a local comic in town. As some of you may know, I’ve been taking stand-up comedy class and loving every second of it. So I was so excited to watch jokes with a newfound love of the comedy process. 

In my stand-up class, one of the students found an article online that said “moral” people don’t get jokes as much as “immoral” people. I found this fascinating because—usually I get jokes! (so now you know my level of morality). And I thought this was sad because—I love to laugh at jokes. Does being “moral” really make you less fun?

One of the stand-up openers for the show even discussed that he did not want moral people around him while he was ready to have fun because they’d be a downer. And it made me flashback to the time in middle school when I found out there was an inside joke going around where everyone said “No Erica” because apparently I was the morality police and no one wanted me around. 

Interestingly, as I was dislocating at the comedy club, surrounded by my fellow “immoral” people, I was reading Luke 5, where the Pharisees grumble about Jesus for eating and drinking with tax collectors rather than fasting and acting pious. 

And doesn’t this scene in Luke ring some bells for some of us Christians? Some of us draw a line between those who are “moral” and “immoral.” We say “don’t get too close to them or they’ll rub off on you and affect your beliefs!” So some of us surround ourselves only with Christians who adhere to our sense of morality so that we’re “safe.” And some of us only hang out with our “lost” friends because we’re trying to convert them.

Yet in Luke 5:27-39, Jesus does the exact opposite. Jesus eats and drinks while the Pharisees fast and judge. Jesus hangs out with outcasts and robbers while the Pharisees hang out with mirror versions of themselves. The Pharisees wait for Jesus to tell everyone to repent at the party (1), but Jesus just has a good time. Jesus celebrates life while the Pharisees never live it. 

And Jesus is funny. I picture Jesus holding a beer in his hand and saying to the disciples and Pharisees with a wink in his eye, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:31, NIV). And he winks because surely those Pharisees who study the law intensely know the verse well that says, “Indeed, there is no one on earth who is righteous…” (Ecc 7:20, NIV).

Later in Luke, Jesus says he came to “seek and save those who are lost” (Luke 19:10, NIV)(2). And the thing is, we are all lost in something. We could be lost in more obvious things like pain killers, alcohol, an affair. Yet there are those of us who are lost in less obvious ways. Those of us who are lost in our own letters of the law. Those of us who need freedom from the confines of a rigid and judgement-filled religion. Those of us who can’t count blessings because we’re too busy counting sins.

Friends, we don’t need to wait until heaven to start celebrating. We can start today. Seek out the God who gives grace in place of judgement, who creates purpose from pain, who lifts up those who are low, who wants you to find freedom in this life, and who is waiting with open arms for you in the life to come. 

Let us pray: Grace-filled and eternally loving God, thank you for seeking and saving those who are lost. However we are lost today, may we find freedom through your saving grace. Amen. 

Reflect: How have you ever acted like the Pharisees, judging others on the periphery? What might you be projecting onto others?

Work Referenced:
(1) Alan R. Culpepper, “Luke” in The New Interpreters Bible Commentary Volume VIII, (Abingdon Press: Nashville, 2015) 104.
(2) Ibid., 105.


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