The Ultimate Homecoming

October is the typical month for Homecoming festivities whether in high school or college.  We attended the 30th anniversary of my graduation from Valparaiso University.  Yes, I know it is hard to believe that I am 30 years removed from my graduation.  The turnout at Valpo was very disappointing but still got to see a few of my fraternity brothers.  We also stopped by and saw my old friend, roommate, and fraternity big brother on the way home after 30 years.  We spent time reminiscing and getting caught up.  My wife was a jewel enduring the conversations of that weekend although secretly she was texting our daughter saying to “get her out of here”.


I got to pontificating on what home really is.  I know how good it feels to arrive home after a long day at work.  When our kids were young, they would yell “DADDY” always a reminder of the joy of being at home.  You just get a general sense of peacefulness arriving at home.  Home is where family and friends are.  We have a core group of friends that we get together with typically once a month or at least once a quarter.  We got together with friends this past Friday and we just laughed and laughed.  I could always take or leave these kinds of social gatherings, but the older I get, the more I appreciate them because they represent home as well.

But despite the love of being at home, in this life we will never feel completely at home.  Because home here is only for a small percentage of our eternal existence.  There is a longing to be somewhere else where the frailty of life does not exist and the presence of the eternal God is omnipresent.  Now Jesus says in John 14 that this is a physical place that He is preparing for us.  It will have many rooms, but more importantly this place is where He is.  And he has been preparing such a place for me (and you) for over 2000 years.  If that is the case, then as the late songwriter Keith Green says then “we are living in a garbage can compared to what is up in heaven”.  The Bible says we yearn to arrive at our eternal home.  I have got to believe that the pleasure of home in this life will be a drop in the bucket compared to the pleasures we will experience in our eternal home.

At our 30th college reunion, you see all kinds of people.  Some that age well and some that don’t age well.  But eventually all of us do age.  The law of entropy says that we all degenerate and decay.  But heaven does not experience entropy.  In fact, I think it gets better over time because the addition of souls is what makes it better.  As we arrive at this Homecoming, we will be forever reminded of the ultimate sacrifice made by Christ allowing us a ticket to this special Homecoming.