Contributed By: Rev. Mark Breese
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Pastor Mark is the Agency Minister and the VP of Ministry & Community partnerships at Community Missions.

Apparently, many of my relatives are going through their houses cleaning, sorting, organizing and whatever else they could do to make use of the time while hunkering down at home.  I know this because I was on Facebook the other day and saw some old photos they were posting. I smiled a little, cried a little, and generally had a bit of a wallow in the nostalgic pond of days gone by.

Mostly, it got me thinking of home—which was funny, because I was sitting at home. Of course what that really meant was I was thinking of my childhood home, the home my dad built, my mother made, and where I was, to a large extent, formed as a person. That house in New Jersey was been sold to a young couple and hopefully they are building a family and memories there that are mostly filled with love.

All this has had me remember a particular day a few years ago just after my mom had to sell that family home. I was in my office in the homeless shelter where I work, head in hands, feeling sad and, I guess, looking sad. One of the residents, a young woman who had been in the shelter for a couple of weeks, tapped on my open door, and asked “Pastor, are you ok?” I pulled out my smile and said I was fine, and how could I help her.

“I’m fine,” she answered, and “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Really, just tell me,” she pressed.

“No, really, I’m ok. I was feeling sad about my mom having to sell her house, the house I grew up in. It’s silly. It was a blessing and now it can be a blessing to some other family. I’m ok. What can I do for you?.”

She sat down and we talked for a while, about nothing really. It happens a lot there—just talking in the moments of struggle between the efforts to get a life back on track.

She pulled a book off the shelf next to her and flipped through it absently as we talked, and she laughed, politely, at the jokes I attempted to make.

“Well” she said, “hang in there Pastor.”

“No problem,” I said. “And thank you for noticing I was a bit sad. I’m fine, really I am.”

“Oh I know you’re gonna be fine Pastor,” she said, putting the book back on the shelf, and getting up to leave “Cause you have your family here. We’ll take care of you. See you at lunch Pastor.”

God’s house has many rooms prepared for us, we are told in the Gospel of John. We walk in and out of them every day—most of the time probably not knowing we are doing just that.

I believe utterly that eternity is under way right now. That newness of life in Christ is right now, not just some future experience we are promised. How else could it be that a person in the middle of being homeless, can walk in my door and tell me that she has my back and will take care of me?

Folks, cherish and be grateful for your families and your homes. But keep your eyes, ears, and especially your hearts open. We all walk in a much bigger home, with a family that is endlessly large, and we need to love and care for each other.

Pastor Mark