Advent Midweek Reflection, Week One - Childhood Home

This is the outline of the reflection I shared at last week's Advent midweek Vespers service. As one might expect, this outline does not contain exactly the words that were spoken, but it's pretty close.

Before the reflection, the following was read.

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You who live in the shelter of the Most High, who abide in the shadow of the Almighty,will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress; my God, in whom I trust.”       ~ Psalm 91:1-2

My people will abide in a peaceful habitation, in secure dwellings, and in quiet resting places.      ~ Isaiah 32:18

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We all kinda wanna go home
      especially around Christmastime

I remember my childhood home

there was a front door on our house

            that we never used

      the front door opened on to a living room

            that we hardly ever used

 we spent time in the sun porch

      the tv room

            and the kitchen

in the summer, the door between the sun porch

            and the car port

      was almost always open

            and the screen door constantly banged shut

                  as we blurred the boundary between inside and out

in winter, the wood burning stove

            on the sun porch

      is where we’d spend much of our time

            huddled around the warmth

eventually, though, us kids had to go to bed

      in our bedroom,

            far from the burning wood in the stove

      on the other end of a drafty house

            that wasn’t well insulated

I’d run as fast as I could manage

      I'd launch myself into the bed

            creating a cocoon

                  by tucking the blankets under my feet & under my shoulders

                        leaving as little space around me as possible

      I’d stay perfectly still

            until my body heat took the edge off the cold

***

and I was home

      and I felt safe and secure

***

I went back years later

            drove a borrowed car out the two lane road

                  turned on the single lane tarmac

      turned again on the two-track gravel

                  (one track for the passenger side wheels, one for the wheels on the driver’s side)

            and stopped close enough to talk to the owners

                  but far enough away to not be a threat

I told them I’d grown up there

      they invited me to take a walk around

driving away, I realized that place wasn't home

Home is the place, or condition

      or community

            or family

                 or reality

      in which we feel cared for

            safe,

                  and loved.