O Lord, you have examined my heart and know everything about me. You know when I sit down or stand up. You know my thoughts even when I’m far away. You see me when I travel and when I rest at home. You know everything I do. Psalm 139:1-3
It’s an incredible experience, being in a foreign country, far from home. I know people do it all the time, but for me it was a big step. Even though I travel all over the US, I’m still basically a “home-body” at heart. That’s why I take my house with me where ever I go! Yet here I am - miles from anything familiar, surrounded by people with whom I cannot communicate because I do not speak their language. And I feel strangely at home. That’s the power of God at work. There is no other possible explanation.
My son, the kid who can make conversation with anyone anywhere is feeling a little frustrated because he cannot communicate the way he would like to. I guess I am at a slight advantage here with my less-social approach to life… I am trying to learn the language, because I would LIKE to be able to communicate and to understand better what is going on around me, but I am strangely at peace here.
It is a beautiful place in which I find myself. I’m situated at the top of a hill, with an amazing view out my back door. I’m surrounded by green - plants and trees I’ve never seen before - and they are BEAUTIFUL! There are birds and animals and all kinds of interesting sounds and sites, and I am just trying to drink it all in, though it sometimes feels like a dream.
But the really wonderful thing about it all is that here I am - many miles from home - and God is here! It’s something that I’ve always known was true - that God is not bound by time or space, and that He is everywhere at all times, but I never had experienced the reality of that knowledge. As the psalmist says in verse 6, “Such knowledge is too wonderful for me, too great for me to understand!”
Just a thought, from a land far away…
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