Misplaced

I suppose it makes sense that it is on my worst days that I long most achingly for my best days.

If you have known me for any length of time, you probably know about my 2013 and 2014 summer adventures in Juneau, Alaska. As time passes, I talk about it less, but nary a day goes by that it does not cross my mind.

Sure, I went to Alaska on Juneau Summer Project with Cru. It was the absolute time of my life, and sometimes I miss summer project more than anything else: the people, the relationships, the community.

But days like today, I ache for Alaska itself most of all: the terrain, the miserably wet weather, the water, the chill remedied only by a campfire, the wildlife, the glacier, the trees. I could go on.

Today was a rough day at work for me. It was very stressful and I felt like my arms were being pulled in multiple directions at once all day. I put 116 miles on my truck just from driving clients around town. I love my job but today it was just not easy and the whole day I felt like I was failing. I left the office with a stack of work to finish tomorrow, which I hate to do to my future self, but I just couldn't stay late today; eight hours was enough to do me in.

Days like this make me wonder about the meaning of home. I love my city. I love, love, love it. I love my living situation. I love my job. I love all the people here. I love the busyness and vibrancy. I adore my church. I love seeing God move in a city that I have become invested in. I love the fruits that are starting to grow because I have decided to root myself here.

I love this place like it is my home. But somehow I do not feel entirely at home here.

My citizenship is in Heaven. I recognize that and I long for it desperately. I can't wait to brush off my hands from the work of this life and rest in Paradise. But I've never been there. I don't really know what it's like.

What I do know is the one and only: Juneau, Alaska.

I will never forget the first time I saw snow-covered mountains. I was flying from Seattle to Juneau in May 2013. I was listening to "Sometimes" by David Crowder Band on my iPod. My breath was taken away. My jaw dropped.

It was my first glimpse of the magnificence I would be immersed in for the next two months and for another six weeks a year later.

Can I really only have spent three and a half months in Juneau over the duration of my life? How can a place I have spent so little time in inhabit such a large portion of my heart?

Last Sunday, my pastor talked about being in the world but not of it (based on John 17:10-19). I can feel it. I feel my other-worldliness. I can feel how misplaced I am here. I can feel that I am home, but only sort of.

This is why my aching love for Juneau makes such a great metaphor for Heaven. I love it so much more than where I am. I love it for selfish reasons: I love what it does for my soul. I have never felt closer to God than in the Alaskan wilderness. He is surely here in my city. He surely resides in my heart wherever I go. But his might is so tender in Juneau. His intimacy is so near.

I have had a foretaste of the feast to come.

I can't go back to Juneau right now, as much as I wish I could, just as I can't go to Heaven right now, as much as I would love to.

I am "stuck" in this city, on this planet.

But it's coming. I will go back to Juneau. And I will reach Heaven, and when I get there I am never coming back. How could I? I will finally be home. For now, I will rooten* myself where God wants me to be rooted.


God bless.



* "Rooten" is a word I made up a couple blog posts ago. I'm keeping and recycling it.