Just Passing Through- Heaven is My Home

"If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you." -John 15:19

As I sit around the people I am in contact with on a regular daily basis, those in the world on my job, I realize more than ever that I am not at home. I don't think I have ever realized this so much. It is so bizarre to me, although I am content in the fact that God is providing for my needs etc., something is off; the things that I desire, the passions I have and the motivation and will I have to live is far different from those around me. They talk of riches, drinking, sex, and all other worldly things; their joy is wrapped up in the moment and in everything temporal, their home is here. I look around at the things of this world and I can't help but ache in my heart for the lost, for the hopeless and for the sin of this world...it literally breaks my heart. And then I wonder why I feel so out of place.

Recently I have been confused as to what on earth God wants me to do with my life...I am 22 years old, single, graduated from college and what am I doing with my life? Working at a bank!!!! Whatttt??? That is exactly what goes through my head almost weekly, I don't understand at times what on earth I am doing here and worse I question God's goodness. Now I know in my head He is faithful but so often it doesn't translate to my heart. I know that He wanted me here for a time because I have had the opportunity to share Him with those who don't know Him around me, and this opportunity has opened my eyes to many things I have never seen and built character I had never had to build. I thought coming into this season of my life that I would just "be faithful" and then God would move me on, but I wonder often why after being "faithful" to where He has called me why He hasn't called me out yet. I mean I have shared the Gospel, I sit all day and write, read and pour over sermons and Christian literature feeding my brain with every piece of knowledge I can get and then I wonder often why the passions and desires that I have within my heart aren't being used! I sit all day at a bank and I am waiting...waiting for God to get me out of here, waiting for him to use me, waiting for God to fulfill the desires of my heart, to take the talents and sanctified desires He has given me and use them for His glory! But here I sit, waiting.

Now back to my original thought, I promise this all ties in :). So as I sit here waiting and wondering what on earth God is doing with my life, why I am here and why I feel so out of place I realized a most reassuring Truth...I am just passing through! That's right, this isn't my home! No wonder I feel out of place around those who don't know Him, no wonder I don't find joy in the same things they do, no wonder I don't desire the same things they do but in fact the exact oppostie almost, no wonder I long for God to use me for His glory, no wonder I ache for the lost sinners of this world, no wonder! I wasn't made for this earth, I was made for a heavenly kingdom...and my treasure, my home, my joy is in Him and Him alone.

I know how terribly wrong and skewed my thinking has become, and I have to keep preaching to myself the Truth that God knows exactly what He is doing and He has me here until He leads otherwise. I will continue to be faithful because He who has called me IS faithful! I was reading John 17 and I was so encouraged by the fact that JESUS PRAYS FOR US! He is praying for us and intercedding for us to the Father. He prayed for the disicples who would be left on this earth, not that God would remove them but rather that He would protect them. In John 17:6 we are reminded that "They are not of the world, even as I am not of it." So although we are not of this world we live on this world and we can trust in a Father who is guiding us along the way. We must be faithful to where He has placed us and keep our eyes fixed on the goal, all the while remembering that we are simply passing through. When we don't feel at home, when we feel out of place in our works or schools, when we are grieved by the sin of this world and of our hearts, when we are confused about the plans of the Lord and what we see happening around us, we can cling tightly to the promise and Truth that we are not at home here, but simply passing on through. And we MUST keep that perspective; oh how dangerous it can become if we start getting comfortable with this world and giving into the desires of our flesh. We must battle that until the day it dies...the flesh and all its desires that is.

And I and you must remember that He in His timing will put me or you where He wants us, but until then we can cling tight to the promise of our hope, Jesus Christ, and that we are just passing through because heaven is where we belong. C.S. Lewis said it well, "The Christians who did most for the present world were precisely those who thought most of the next. It is since Christians have begun thinking less of the other world that they have become so ineffective in this. Aim at heaven and you get earth thrown in; aim at earth and you get neither."