{17} We Wait Because We're Wandering

My brother sent me this movie trailer for Somewhere Between.  It's a documentary about American teenagers who were adopted from China.  One says, "I don't think I could ever consider myself fully Chinese or fully American [...] I'm always going to be sort of somewhere between."

TRAILER: Somewhere Between - A Feature Documentary from Linda Knowlton on Vimeo.

As an internationally adoptive mother, I'm fascinated and broken-hearted and want to take these young girls by the hand and crank up Mandi Mapes' song "Stranger"... because the point of the song is that it's good for Christians to feel out of place in this world.

 this world is not my home
i am a stranger in this country
jesus in me
won't you pour me out, i'm ready
to abandon
all these shiny things
my family
and this american dream, lord.
come take it all from me
until there's nothing left
but you

No, I don't know how it feels to be in these girls shoes.  But I do know that those of us who wait know what it means to be stuck between.

Remember towards the beginning of this series, when we discovered that waiting is universal?  Well, maybe it's a little more universal than I even let on.  Because if you call yourself a Christian, then you are identifying yourself with a people who wander in the desert and live often in the Land Between.  We long for a better country... a heavenly one (Heb 11:6).

I want to tell these not quite Chinese and not quite American girls, "You're right! You're not home in either country... but no daughter of Christ is at home in any country on this planet."
I want to tell them, and you, sweet waiting believer, that the Bible says we are aliens in this world.  It's just that most of us forget that.  Pain blesses you with a reminder of the truth... this world is not home.  As Christians, we wander for a short while on this globe before going Home.

We feel out of place,
stuck in the middle,
not at home...
because that's what we are.

Every ache, every lack of resolution... it is a merciful reminder that this world is not your home.

• Waiting on a husband?  Heaven is the ultimate wedding banquet.
• Waiting for healing? Christ is the great Physician
• Waiting for financial security? Where will you be more secure than eternally in His arms?
• Waiting for a child? You're learning how God aches to gather His own children to Himself, from the ends of the earth.
• Waiting for God's will?  In Eternity, we'll see the fullness of His will unfold.

Whatever you're waiting for,

thank God for the reminder that this Earth is not the goal.

The Earth is not our home.

So we're a little homesick.

Thank God He's given us a sense of where Home is.
(And where it is not).

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Please consider looking through the comments in this series 

and praying for our sisters who wait.

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Waiting? Hurting? 

Have God-glorifying ideas for this series?

Comment or email me.

rachelgoode1@gmail.com

We'd love to pray for you all month.

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Today was Day 17 of
31 Days of Waiting:
Day 1     Day 2     Day 3     Day 4     Day 5     Day 6     Day 7     Day 8     Day 9     Day 10     Day 11     Day 12     Day 13     Day 14     Day 15     Day 16     Day 17     Day 18     Day 19     Day 20     Day 21     Day 22     Day 23     Day 24     Day 25     Day 26     Day 27     Day 28     Day 29     Day 30     Day 31