Homesickness

I’ve been tossing this blog post around in my head for quite a few days now. It feels like weeks, but then I realize that I have been here less than two weeks. It feels like lots more than that already!

This post is about homesickness. I always thought that feeling homesick was an emotional feeling of missing that which you are accustomed to. I never realized, before now, that it is actually a physical thing. My mind and emotions are not screaming to go home, sleep in my own bed, eat my own food, sit on my own couch, drive my own car, or any of that. I am glad to be here spending some time with my boys and experiencing this new culture. But there is definitely a physical feeling, one I can’t truly describe but might put it as not being comfortable in your own skin, feeling yucky and not knowing why, or like when you are hungry but nothing sounds good. As I was sitting here a few days ago in a foreign land where there are few people I can communicate with, trying to come up with a description for this physical feeling, it hit me (or rather God showed me). Jesus had to have felt this when he was here on earth. If I am feeling this just being away from my home, country, friends & family, how much MORE would He have felt it being away from God?! And He endured it much longer than I have to, and I will not have to go through what He did at the end of it to get back to where I am homesick for. Once again, it hits me just how much He endured for us. How can I not do this little thing He is asking me to do in order to give two orphans a family? So whenever that physical….whatever…hits me, I now praise the one who has walked this path before me, for he knows exactly what I am feeling. And I remember exactly what He sacrificed for me. And I become ashamed that, at times, I find it a little difficult to do these small sacrifices for my boys so I complain to God that it is too hard so I ask Him to make it easier. And I turn that complaining into praise for each trying, difficult, hard, emotional, crazy step. For it brings me closer to Him.

The Lord is my strength and my shield; my heart trusted in Him, and I am helped; therefore my heart greatly rejoices, and with my song I will praise Him.   Psalm 28:7

I would have lost heart, unless I had believed that I would see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living.  Psalm 27:13

He who is of a proud heart stirs up strife, but he who trusts in the Lord will be prospered.  Proverbs 28:25

Trust in the Lord with all your heart, and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge Him, and he shall direct your paths.  Proverbs 3:5-6