Greetings,
Recently I viewed online some photographs of severe flooding in the area where I grew up. I still have cousins living in the area and could picture their situation clearly in my mind. Seeing familiar locations from my childhood in the news reports made me think of a question I am asked frequently: “Where do you think of as home?” To me this is an important question because the answer cannot be disassociated from God calling me into His Church and His way of life.
Our “sense of place” is a combination of factors but it is a strong identity with a particular location. The Barna Research Group conducted a survey on what people love most about their cities. Here are some comments from the results of that survey:
“More than work opportunities, the weather or great restaurants and entertainment, respondents consistently rate relational factors the highest. Across every generational group, adults cite friendships as the thing they love most about the city in which they currently reside. Friendships are the highest factor for Millennials (27%), and stay fairly consistent (16%-18%) for the rest of the generational groups … the most consistent characteristics that make a place worth staying in are relational.”
It is quite interesting that relational factors – the people who occupied the space we grew up in – are so important. The core of these relationships would be family. In my case our extended family tended to be concentrated in the same general area. Our family social life mostly involved getting together with relatives.
After being called, our sense of place undergoes a spiritual transformation. This may be a process over time, but one way or another we gain a sense that our family is also now populated by people in whom God’s Spirit dwells. We are added to a spiritual body composed of Spirit led people who are “knit together in love” (Colossians 2:2). Our sense of place is established by a relationship with our Father and His Son, Jesus Christ. However, once we have this relationship established, our “sense of place” is strengthened by relationships with other similarly minded people. As Christ said, “For whoever does the will of God is My brother and My sister and mother” (Mark 3:35).
We must be impressed by the sheer weight of scripture that directs us to develop strong relationships — brotherly love — with others in the body of Christ. For example, the simple but direct statement from John, “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another” (1 John 4:11). Our love of God is expressed by the keeping of His commandments (1 John 5:3). This common set of beliefs and practices bring us into a sense of community – a family relationship. Our sense of family will build from the people who occupy the place in which we reside.
There is an old expression “Home is where your heart is.” Wherever God’s people are should always feel like home and provide a sense of place.
Warm Regards,
Brian Orchard
