Going Home

Yesterday I arrived home from a visit to my hometown in southern California.  That’s why this posting is two days late. 

I was mainly there to help my mom with an outpatient surgery. 

The trip was both good and hard.

It was good because of happy childhood memories, family and friends.  I always like to see my hometown again.  It was hard because my mother was at the point where decisions had to be made about her future.

On the way to my mother’s house, I went through the city where I was born (Inglewood) while driving to and from the LA International Airport on the 105 Freeway.  There, on the north side, was SoFi stadium, said to be the most expensive stadium in the world, home to two NFL teams. 

That stadium sits on the exact site of the old Hollywood Park racetrack.  The racetrack was where my dad rode horses as a social hobby with his co-workers at North American Aviation.  They were called the Arabian Horsemen (if I remember correctly).  They dressed up in Arab costumes and, while riding horses, jabbed stakes that were stuck in the ground, then they twirled the stakes, which had streamers attached, over their heads as they rode on.  Very theatrical, and very cool for a kid to see his dad doing that.  The group was featured in a magazine article and on a TV show.  Now the site is covered by a fancy football stadium. 

I’d choose the memories of my dad over the fancy new stadium anyday. 

My hometown was La Mirada–about 20 miles east of Inglewood.  Its where I lived longer than anywhere else; my first 19 years of life. 

My mother still lives in the same house I grew up in.  Last week I slept in the same room as I did when I was a kid. 

I looked up an old high school friend, we spent some time together. 

I went out for a night to Knott’s Berry Farm (an amusement park in Orange County) with my brother, his wife and youngest son.  I’d gone there as a kid for as long as I can remember. 

I went to church with my mother and chatted with the people.  Got a tour of the new church building; it was first time to see it from the inside. 

But the main reason I went out was to look after my mother while she had an outpatient surgery. 

My mom is getting up there.  She can’t drive anymore.  She is getting forgetful.  This whole old age thing can be very tough. 

She wants to live alone, but really can’t anymore.  We are faced with difficult decisions.  No one wants to lose their independence.  We made plans to move her to a nearby retirement home. 

But, speaking of nostalgia, I’ve been glad to have this home to go home to.  No matter where we’ve lived, it always felt good to have that anchor of my hometown to visit. 

I don’t think there is any harm in nostalgia, unless it keeps us from effective living in the here and now.  We have to go where we have to go and do what we have to do.  That might mean one city for your whole life, or many cities. 

Our time in ministry has taken Alice and I to three states and one other country.  We never felt totally rooted to any particular location.  Maybe that will change, but I suspect there will be more moving in the future.  We feel like God and family are our home more than any city or state.

This brings to mind the idea of place.  God recognizes our humanity and our longing for significant places in our lives. 

The significance Jerusalem is an example.  It’s a place of pilgrimage.  Though God never says, “I require every Christian to visit Jerusalem,” he places special significance to that physical place.  The Psalms extol it.  It was the site of the temple.  It was the place where Jesus walked and taught and was crucified.  It will figure in end-times prophecy. 

While we should be more focused on that “heavenly Jerusalem” (Galatians 4:26, Hebrews 12:22) and while we know that the presence of the One who is over the earthly Jerusalem can live within our hearts through the Holy Spirit, there is still some attraction to that physical place.  

I’ve been there.  There’s something to it. 

But physical places are secondary to having God, who goes with you wherever you go. Going to God is like going home.

I had a professor in college who said he viewed heaven as a homegoing, like he would be going to the most familiar, comfortable place even though he had not been there yet.  I knew what he meant.  There is a longing for heaven in the heart of a believer, a longing for a place we haven’t been to, but we somehow know is going to be deeply familiar and comforting and ‘right’–more than any strong feeling of nostalgia associated with happy places we knew in this world. 

Thanks for reading these ramblings.  I’m still processing my trip.