These all died in faith without having received the promises, but they saw them from a distance, greeted them, and confessed that they were foreigners and temporary residents on the earth.  Hebrews 11:13

Have you noticed that things here become less appealing as you’ve aged?  Have you gotten to the place where you feel like a misfit, a stranger, and an alien?  If your answer is yes, you’re in the company of those in the family of God who have refused to dig their foundation into shifting sand.

The steep walk of faith is a lonely journey.  There are fewer and fewer, even among God’s children, who stay on the narrow path. The numbers who hunger and thirst after righteousness diminish as faith walks get steeper.  Jesus loses appeal when held up against the opiates of our age.

Ah, but for everyone who perseveres, our eyes search for other pilgrims who also talk longingly of home. Everything we’re praying for hasn’t happened yet.  Everything we’re hoping for is deferred.  That’s okay.   Like Abraham, we can see it from a distance.

Ron’s father, a well-known evangelist, would say to a crowd of people before giving an invitation, “I’m as sure of heaven as though I’d already been there for 1,000 years.”  Who talks like that?  Only one who has made his home in Christ.  The Psalmist said, Hear my prayer, O LORD, and give ear unto my cry; hold not thy peace at my tears: for I am a stranger, and a sojourner, as all my fathers were. Psalm 39:12  A longing can be heard as he perpetually scans the horizon for the lights of Jerusalem.  As for Jack Wyrtzen, he saw it in 1996 as Jesus welcomed him home.

My cure for worry, Lord?  Being consumed with what awaits me. Amen