From the Rector…
Home is where the heart is. A pithy little saying that, even in its shallowness, rings true in the depths of our souls. As we mature, we become less attached to a particular place as “home” though some places feel much more like home than others. We have moved—at least once and more likely multiple times as we transition from our childhood homes—to new houses, to new towns, sometimes even to different countries. Each move requires us to release something old and comfortable and adjust to something new and unknown. Sometimes we leave places filled with happy memories and good times that stir in us a sense of grief and loss. Sometimes we focus on the excitement of new possibilities and potential such that our joy overwhelms any sense of regret. Either way, the more we move, the more convinced we become that a house might contribute to our understanding of home, but that understanding is incomplete without the lived experience of the family who occupies it.
Jesus was born in Bethlehem and his family quickly moves to Egypt having been warned in a dream to go there to escape Herod. After Herod dies, Joseph receives another dream in which he is told to return home. However, Judea is now ruled by Herod’s son, so Joseph takes his family to Nazareth in Galilee instead. Nazareth will become Jesus’ hometown. We don’t know what age Jesus was when his family moved there, but I expect that they experienced the same sort of emotional upheaval that accompanies any move—excitement for the new possibility, a little angst in the unknown, sadness at leaving behind friends and the life they had built for themselves in Egypt, and a period of adjustment to their new home.
It’s interesting to think that Jesus as a young child would have experienced what any young child does in the face of such life-changing upheaval. Moves, though exciting, can also be difficult for children. It’s also interesting to realize that we can relate to Mary and Joseph and what they might have been experiencing emotionally as well as logistically in the preparation of that move.
In the book, The No. 1 Ladies’ Detective Agency, Alexander McCall Smith writes about home as the place where the very dirt gets into your skin. You become so grounded in a place that it forms you and makes you who you are. That is true about people too. You connect so deeply to certain people that without them you become lost and can no longer find home. When your heart starts to ache for a certain place or person, you know that they are part of your home.
There is more to home than just people and places. Scripture reminds us that the foundation of our home matters—to build upon sand is unstable and will lead to failure but to build upon rock is to build upon a solid foundation that can take the battering of waves and storms. (Matthew 7:24-27) Jesus offers this as a parable and the metaphor is telling—the foundation of our home must be in God. When our home is rooted in the love of God, the places and people who fill that home do so in love, and thus home is always in our hearts.
Home can be anywhere, and it is always the place filled with love. That is why home is where the heart is because it is the place filled with love.