Far From Home
Lejos del Hogar
by
Mary Hunt Webb
Posted Saturday, July 29, 2023
Summer is not only a time for traveling, but it's also a time when many people move from one location to another. [Photographer: Peter H. Tama66. Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com.]
Summer is a time for moving. Students leave the safety and familiarity of home to go to boarding schools or to college while families move from one community and state to another for various reasons.
Our son was three years old when my husband's job with the federal government took us away from family near the interior of the country to the San Francisco Bay area near the Pacific Ocean. With no family nearby to encourage us or even to provide occasional childcare, we truly felt alone among three million people. The first church that we joined there did not provide the emotional support we needed. The members of that church had all known each other for so long that newcomers like us could not easily fit in. I truly felt that if one of us died there, no one would attend the funeral or memorial service. It seemed that no one cared.
In desperation, we began looking at other churches. As a meteorologist, my husband had to work a shift forecasting weather one Sunday evening while I took our pre-school age son to a small church near a busy expressway that was not far from our home. As soon as we entered, the people there greeted us with a friendly enthusiasm one normally associates with puppies! Even the children immediately pulled our son into their group.
The children at that church were mostly small boys, and they quickly pulled our son into their group. [Photographer: Kris White. Photo courtesy of Pixabay.com.]
Before the evening was over, someone even asked me, "Would you like to join the choir?"
As a first-timer, the question surprised me but it also assured me that acceptance there would not be a problem. They truly reflected the warmth of friendship and the light of God's love to us in a way that exemplified Matthew 5:16, which says, "Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven." (NIV)
After my husband heard of our positive experience, he went with us the next week. We felt so included that we made that our church home. The church members became our West Coast family during the four years we were there. Although we have been gone from that area for more than four decades, that church remained part of us. The light of love that they showed us continues to radiate to this day.
Consequently, we felt sad when we learned that the church membership had dwindled so much that the property was eventually sold to a congregation that spoke a different language. While we were glad that the property was still being used as a church, we were sad that it was not the that one we remembered. Still, part of us will always rejoice that the little church near the expressway was there to show us God's love when we needed it the most.
From our experience there, we learned how important it is to greet new families, new students and new neighbors and to help them feel included in the same way that others in that little church in the San Francisco Bay Area did for us so many decades ago.
Prayer: Loving Lord, please remind me to greet others with the kind of friendliness and warmth that I would want to receive if I were far away from home. I pray this in the name of Jesus. Amen.
BIBLE VERSE USED IN THIS POSTING
Matthew 5:16 — Let your light shine before others, that they may see your good deeds and glorify your Father in heaven. (NIV)
Mateo 5:16 — Así alumbre vuestra luz delante de los hombres, para que vean vuestras buenas obras, y glorifiquen a vuestro Padre que está en los cielos (Reina-Valera 1960)
No matter how you spell it, school starts every autumn. [Source: everyday-wisdom.com.]
