There’s No Place Like Home

This past week, I made a surprise trip to DC! Surprise–to myself. I got to lead a short term trip for AIM, and it was such an awesome experience!

 

My little travel day was ROUGH–I was just not feeling good, and the first thing I did when I walked out my door was step on an anthill. Ironically enough, it was in the midst of painful ant bites and not feeling well that I truly learned what it meant for me to find my home in the Lord.

 

Travelling by myself to lead 2 youth groups, of which I knew no one, felt just as much like home as Georgia, which feels just as much like home as North Carolina. In the random layover in Miami, I felt at home. When I made it to DC, I felt at home.

 

You get the idea.

 

It was during this trip that the Lord brought me to a place of realizing that I have no home in this world. That my home is in Him, and Him alone–and as He goes with me, every place I go becomes home because He is there. I felt just as much at home with a group of 17 humans I had never met as I felt when I went home to visit my family back in May, or as I felt when I made my way back to Georgia at the end of the week.

 

And it was through this trip that I learned about a gift the Lord has given me–a gift to create an environment of family. A place where strangers can walk in and feel loved and accepted, just like they would by their family. It is SUCH an awesome thing to get to experience, and I am so excited to get to steward this gift well in the coming times. 🙂

 

What does it look like for you to create an environment of family? Maybe it’s bringing in the homeless person off the street for an evening of food and peaceful rest. Maybe it’s inviting your neighbors over to dinner and listening to their story. Whatever it looks like, I encourage you to look into it because it is SO worth it–to love others well, to be Jesus. It’s what we’re called to do. <3