Home

“Where we love is home- home that our feet may leave, but not our hearts.”

-Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.

Over the course of the last few months our feet have trod on some very familiar ground.  More importantly our hearts have been reunited with people we love.  Last month we had the privilege of spending some time in Angelita’s home town of Kenosha, Wisconsin.  Our hearts were made merry as we spoke with many family members and friends about our mission and how they could be a part of it.  We also expanded our hearts as we met new friends from Milwaukee and Racine.

When we returned to New Carlisle from Kenosha, we were only at our house for a short time when we found ourselves among the believers at the New Song Church of God. Now we feel at home in Fairborn, Ohio.

The next weekend we traveled to another place that has captured our hearts, Northeast Ohio.  We felt like we were home at the Simon Road Church of God.  Our hearts were encouraged by the hospitality of the Howards and the Bakers.

Over the next few weeks we stayed close to our home in New Carlisle.  This allowed Timothy to visit several churches in and around his hometown of Middletown, Ohio.  On one recent evening he was honored to sit at a table with people from his home church and speak about our mission.  Looking around the table he realized that he had been on at least one mission trip with half of the people in the room. And our son Tim had been on a recent mission trip with most of the other half.  Once again our hearts swelled with love, with home.

Ever since we began traveling along our mission path the concept of home has become much more focused.  Our hearts are encouraged at the mere sight of our friends and family no matter where they live.  At the same time we have a growing sense of a new home, a home filled with beautiful people who are called by Spanish names.  A home filled with experiences considered foreign in places like Middletown and Kenosha.

As Ecuador looms large on the horizon we take solace in a simple truth. Our feet may leave the place of our childhood but our hearts never will.  And in a grand mystery, as our feet tread on unfamiliar ground, we keep finding ourselves at home in new places.