Longing for Home

“And if I weep let it be as a man who is longing for his home…”~Rich Mullins, Lyrics from “If I Stand”
The following is an excerpt from the transcript of the Homeless Man video about Rich Mullins:
Tom Booth: It was about two weeks before Rich died we spent a couple hours on the phone. He was tired. He was pretty beat-up. Road weary, he’d been out touring quite a bit. And I said, “Rich, you’ve gotta come home. Come to Arizona. Come to New Mexico. Relax a bit.” And he said, “That’s an interesting idea.” He said, “I just spent a day with my mom and at the end of the day I got up and said, ‘Mom I gotta go home.'” And she said, “Home? Chicago is home?” (That’s where he was headed.)
And then he told me, he said, “Tom, nothing’s familiar to me in my life right now. I’ve moved, I’ve changed cities, I’ve changed record companies. My best friend, Beaker, we’re not spending the time we used to. My dog Bear. My manager is different. I don’t recognize anything in my life.” He said, “But that’s okay, I guess I’ll keep singing.”
This section of the video always puts a lump in my throat.It reminds me that none of us are really at home here, that we are all longing for heaven.
I have experienced that stark loneliness at times.Times when everything is going well in life, I am surrounded by friends and family.The bills are being paid and all our major appliances work.
By all counts I should be resting, but I feel isolated and alone.My heart aches as if my chest will break.
The first time I experienced this I felt like I was having a crazy moment.Lately I recognize it for what it truly is.It is deep calling to deep, it is God calling to me from home, my true home.
When I was younger I didn’t understand people talking longingly of going to heaven.Now the closer I become to Christ, the more I long to be with Him.

“For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. …”2Cor.5:1-10