If You Lived Here!
Many road weary travelers have seen the large billboard above the thruway that reads “If you lived here you would be home by now!” The text is usually splashed across a beautifully inviting view of the surrounding landscape. You may be familiar with the popular saying “home is where the hearts is” There is a similar saying from the Bible that says “where your treasure is there your heart will be also”.
God in heaven has placed within each of us a longing for that home. This is not the home you have grown up in although it may have a special place in our hearts and we long to return there. You may have grown up in a place that you would never call home and would never want to return. The longing for the home that God has provided for us is deeper and more persistent than any other longing. Our hearts have an emptiness that only God can fill. Our desire is for the perfect home of love, mercy, grace and forgiveness, the place where you are welcome as you are, but loved too much to be left that way.
When the prodigal son returned home to his father he was a mess. Smelling of swine and rotten food, dirty and sweaty yet his father ran out to him and embraced him. After the boy had placed his life in his father’s hands, repented of his foolish behavior and surrendered all his rights as a son in the hope of being employed as one of his fathers servants, his father spoke words of love. He called for the servants to bring his son to wash and be clothed in the finest clothes he had. He called for the servants to prepare a great banquet for his son and placed a signet ring upon his finger. There he became once more his father’s son and in his mercy and grace he found his place at home.
Are you on your way home? Do you see the sign that God placed in your heart? If you lived here you would be home by now! Will you allow God to change you into the complete and perfect child He created you to be?
This is the treasure, the complete makeover. He will pull you out of the miry clay, out of the overwhelming floods of pain and guilt. In the Bible book of John we read that God so love the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believed on him would not perish but will gain eternal life. We also read that He came unto His own but His own received Him not but as many as received Him to them He gave the right to be called the sons of God. In miraculous displays of who He was, Jesus gave evidence of His deity, God and man, rejected by many and embraced by more, crucified, died and buried, He rose from the dead and appeared to over 500. Eyewitnesses testified unto death as they declared His truth. Jesus said “I and the Father are one” (John10:30 ) Jesus said “I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through me” (John 14:6)
The apostle Paul writes in Romans 6:23 “the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” This gift is the great treasure that we embrace. This is the treasure that draws our hearts to the place we call home.“And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus”. (Ephesians 2:6) We have a place in the heavens and there, where your treasure is, your heart will be also. This is the home where your heart longs to be. Do you hear Jesus calling you home?
Are you a road weary traveler? Are you longing for that wonderful warm and peaceful place you can call home? Do you see the sign God has placed in your heart? Receive Jesus, the gift of God, as the treasure, surrender to Him, embrace Him with your heart and you will be home!
God in heaven has placed within each of us a longing for that home. This is not the home you have grown up in although it may have a special place in our hearts and we long to return there. You may have grown up in a place that you would never call home and would never want to return. The longing for the home that God has provided for us is deeper and more persistent than any other longing. Our hearts have an emptiness that only God can fill. Our desire is for the perfect home of love, mercy, grace and forgiveness, the place where you are welcome as you are, but loved too much to be left that way.
When the prodigal son returned home to his father he was a mess. Smelling of swine and rotten food, dirty and sweaty yet his father ran out to him and embraced him. After the boy had placed his life in his father’s hands, repented of his foolish behavior and surrendered all his rights as a son in the hope of being employed as one of his fathers servants, his father spoke words of love. He called for the servants to bring his son to wash and be clothed in the finest clothes he had. He called for the servants to prepare a great banquet for his son and placed a signet ring upon his finger. There he became once more his father’s son and in his mercy and grace he found his place at home.
Are you on your way home? Do you see the sign that God placed in your heart? If you lived here you would be home by now! Will you allow God to change you into the complete and perfect child He created you to be?
This is the treasure, the complete makeover. He will pull you out of the miry clay, out of the overwhelming floods of pain and guilt. In the Bible book of John we read that God so love the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believed on him would not perish but will gain eternal life. We also read that He came unto His own but His own received Him not but as many as received Him to them He gave the right to be called the sons of God. In miraculous displays of who He was, Jesus gave evidence of His deity, God and man, rejected by many and embraced by more, crucified, died and buried, He rose from the dead and appeared to over 500. Eyewitnesses testified unto death as they declared His truth. Jesus said “I and the Father are one” (John
The apostle Paul writes in Romans 6:23 “the wages of sin is death but the gift of God is eternal life through Jesus Christ our Lord” This gift is the great treasure that we embrace. This is the treasure that draws our hearts to the place we call home.“And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus”. (Ephesians 2:6) We have a place in the heavens and there, where your treasure is, your heart will be also. This is the home where your heart longs to be. Do you hear Jesus calling you home?
Are you a road weary traveler? Are you longing for that wonderful warm and peaceful place you can call home? Do you see the sign God has placed in your heart? Receive Jesus, the gift of God, as the treasure, surrender to Him, embrace Him with your heart and you will be home!
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