Heaven

Can you tell I think about heaven a lot? At least I reference it a lot on here.

But I'll tell you a new reason why I'm excited about and long for heaven. It has to do with moving. My moving and others' moving. (No, we have no idea where in Birmingham or Alabama or the US or the world where we are moving next. This is not a coded message.)

(The Woods, by the way, did not move this year, by God good grace and mercy to me! And our neighbor Aaliyah and her father have moved back in with his parents in the last few weeks. See previous post on moving.)

Bottom line is people I love dearly keep moving away from places where I expect to be able to get to them--primarily St Louis and Birmingham. There are friends I have not seen in over a year, whom I have not spoken with in over a year, that I could immediately pick right back up with should our paths cross for any amount of time. Many of these families are in ministry, and such is the life. God calls us to go, and we do. To Florida. Texas. California. Equador. Thailand. New Zealand. Of course other jobs require moving as well--to Tennessee or Georgia or even just the greatest small town in Alabama. Odds are I probably won't see many of these precious people again. And that hurts. Because I love them. And I want to have access to them.

But how much bigger is my investment in the world growing because of the personal, intimate connections I have with people all over it?! I care in a new and different way about the people in Los Angeles because there are specific people there whom I love. When I hear anything about Bangkok, Thailand, I wonder how close that is to my friends who are ministering there in the slums. If it might involve someone they know. Etc, etc.

But I digress. One day, when we all get to heaven, what a day of rejoicing that will be. When we all see Jesus, we'll sing and shout the victory. And I'll have as long as forever to hug their necks and get to catch up with them all!