Does it ever break your heart? Sin tints and distorts everything that once was whole. There are few things that it has not touched. But God does not let the story end there…
Category: Where Homes Converge
Where Homes Converge: Beauty
All beautiful things reflect the Beauty of God. All beautiful things should point us toward heaven. Toward the day when we will see perfect Beauty made manifest as we enter Zion.
Even the ugly and beautiful things mixed can remind us of our Creator’s beauty. An exquisite…
Where Homes Converge: Service
But Jesus had come to set straight the mindset of the world. Just like He showed the first to be last, He demonstrated how the greatest were to humble themselves in service. He was displaying to the world what had been intended for it when God first created it, a place where heartfelt love and genuine kindness triumph over sin and selfishness.
Where Homes Converge: Worship
This physical witness to the hope that is in us continues far, far outside the church building. Worship happens at home, within families. It also happens individually, even as we step out into the world and reflect our faith to the world around us by living it out. In every situation where this happens, it’s more than a person or a group of people coming to God and hearing from Him: it’s the Kingdom of God coming so close that the rest of the world can see, hear, and touch it.
Where Homes Converge: New Stories
Narnia was my first safe haven. I remember grabbing The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe off of our living room bookshelf and approaching my mom with the question, “Can I read this?” When she said yes, I snuggled up in my bed with my stuffed kitten in the middle of the day. As I opened the book, a feeling of excitement ran through me. By the time I reached the ending line…
Where Homes Converge: Tabernacle
As Andrew Lazo, a C.S. Lewis scholar who specializes in Till We Have Faces, notes, Joy is a signpost to Love. To use the many analogies often referenced in regard to sehnsucht: the longing leads to the Longed For, the blue flowers lead to the Gardener, the mountain leads to the God of the Mountain, the creation leads to the Creator. When you already have the One it all leads to, those signposts on the road to the Destination often just become signposts.
Where Homes Converge: Music
I love listening to music – I love sitting with my headphones on, eyes closed, just absorbing it. This is kind of a new thing for me. Six or seven years ago, I could have cared less. I mean, I didn’t dislike music at all, I just never really sat down with the sole purpose of listening to an album. Totally different story these days….
Where Homes Converge: Reunion
I don’t believe for a moment that it’s wrong to long to see everyone we love in heaven. It will be the one place where the people I wish could all be together finally will be. There will be a joy of reunion when I see my great-grandparents for the first time since I was little and when I finally meet my brother. But again, Lewis expresses it the best in The Last Battle. Along with the excitement of reunion will be the most overwhelming joy of all when I see Jesus for the first time.
Where Homes Converge: Grief
Grief comes when you lose something you loved. You can grieve over all manner of things: relationships, seasons of life, projects gone that you poured yourself into. You can grieve your childhood or your innocence or the conclusion of a beautiful story. But grief in a Christian context also has an element of yearning to it. One day, our grieving tears will be wiped away by the hand of Jesus.
Where Homes Converge: Pain
The world is broken by pain. On the days when we experience it first hand, we long for it to be over. In this life, in this moment. Gone. And we look forward to the next life, when pain will not exist…
Where Homes Converge: Light
Light promises us hope. Even when there is darkness all around us, light is somewhere. There is a lantern burning in the darkest of nights, stars shining against blackest skies. Just like there is always hope. And no matter how long the night may last, we’re always promised morning. Just like no matter how long the sin in this world persists, believers are promised perfection and healing in heaven.
Where Homes Converge: Stories
Stories are the stuff that reality is made of. They show us truth and point us toward the greatest Story ever told…
Where Homes Converge: Summer Series!
Has it ever occurred to you that it is possible to have two earthly homes? One is the house where you live. Where your nuclear family lives. And the second is the one that forms when you are surrounded by your people. Your friends that make up a second family, tied not with blood but with connection at the heart level. A family that can be just as strongly bonded together as your family. So that when you’re with these people, no matter where, you are home?