Home

Home. I am pretty sure I have said (and heard) that word more in the past few weeks than I have in my entire life. Webster's dictionary has several definitions for "home". The first, "The place where one resides." Hmmmmm.....maybe, maybe not. The last, "A place of security and comfort." Now that's more like it! When I think of "home", the first thing that pops into my head is my Gramps' house. I did not reside in that house, but I was truly secure and comfortable there. I can close my eyes and walk through every single room as vividly as if it where yesterday. My parent's house (where I resided) had cable t.v. and a VCR.......Gramps had 5 channels (2,4,7,11, and 8 out of Jonesboro, which had the EXACT same shows as 7, only 30 minutes earlier.) My room at my house had a t.v., stereo, stuffed animals, toys, books and was decorated for a girl my age. The room I stayed in at my Gramps' house had.......nothing. A book (The Lifesavers Club about a girl with diabetes that I probably read 50 times), my Grannie's Bible, and.......well, that's about it. Guess where I always wanted to be? I lived at my "house", but Gramps' house was "home". There I felt important, loved, cherished, respected, needed, wanted......you get the picture. One of my favorite songs is by Audrey Assad called "The House You're Building". My favorite line is, "All this time like a vagabond, a homeless stranger, I've been wandering. All my life you've been calling me, to the home you know, I've been needing......" It's hard to move to a new house because you always end up leaving something behind. You may not even miss it for a long time, but one day something reminds you of it, and suddenly you miss it very much. I can't wait until we are able to call Heaven our "home". We will all worship in the same place, hear the ultimate sermon every day, and graze right under the feet of THE shepherd, FOREVER. And I am pretty positive we will not even have to ask which room is ours....We will already know when we get there.......But until then....."Valley, I'm home!......Where do I put my things?" :)