Finding home
When changing times call for adaptability in our day-to-day living situations, considering what it means to dwell in God, Spirit, can anchor us and guide our next steps.
For many in the past few months, adaptability has been the demand, whether it is learning to teach children at home, discovering new resources (lots of improvising going on), or filling the hours creatively and productively.
Even as home life changes, we can feel the uplift and strength of God, divine Love itself. I experienced this during periods of living at the care facilities where I was working and also traveling extensively over the last number of years. Despite these unusual living situations I found stability through gaining an understanding that we all have an anchored unity with God, divine Spirit. And as the children of God, we reflect spiritual qualities such as calm and versatility.
These ideas have resulted in a greater ability to feel a sense of home wherever I am living. At one point, I was starting new employment and needed to find a home. With great expectation, I began my search. But it became a drudgery. Nothing seemed to fit, whether it was the space itself, the rent, or the location.
I knew it was time once again to pray and listen for God’s direction. I have found that humbly yielding to God, good, brings the healing power of God to bear on a situation, and things such as fear, worry, and tension lessen.
One day while praying, I had the thought to join a branch Church of Christ, Scientist. As a Christian Scientist, it was natural for me to become a member of a Christian Science church in whatever community I lived. But in this case, I didn’t know where I was going to live!
Nonetheless, I trustingly followed this inspiration. Little did I know that it was thinking more profoundly about the deeper meaning of Church that would be a guiding light in my search for a home.
Mary Baker Eddy, who discovered Christian Science, searched the Bible to know more about the spiritual reality and substance that comprehensively make up existence. This was the basis upon which she established the Church of Christ, Scientist.
Mrs. Eddy offers a spiritual explanation of “Church,” which she defines in part as “The structure of Truth and Love; whatever rests upon and proceeds from divine Principle” (“Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures,” p. 583). It occurred to me that this was also the spiritual substance of home, sustained by God – divine Truth, Love, and Principle.
The “structure of Truth and Love” is where everyone, in our real, spiritual identity as the reflection of divine Spirit, really lives; and this beautifully framed design includes the serenity and comfort of Love, and the clarity and order of Truth. There is nothing static in this spiritual framework. Whatever activity comes forth from God, good, as Principle – the one divine cause – is progressive with no hindrance.
I began to see that this was my real dwelling. And that we can never be without this home, wherein we are free to express the full range of God’s qualities, such as peace and purity.
These qualities were becoming more present in my consciousness, shaping every aspect of my experience, as I cherished them daily. Yielding to the divine demand to let divine Love encompass my life and to live out from a sense of God’s abundant goodness, I felt tangibly that I was being sustained and maintained on this foundation.
Soon I found a lovely townhouse in a beautiful location that was close not only to my work but also to the church I had joined. Of course, that was great – but the spiritual lessons I learned along the way were truly priceless.
This verse from a hymn in the “Christian Science Hymnal: Hymns 430-603” shines light on the spiritual power of home:
Home is the consciousness of good
That holds us in its wide embrace;
The steady light that comforts us
In every path our footsteps trace.
(Rosemary C. Cobham, alt., No. 497)
If for the moment economic, family, or work issues are calling for shifting perspectives of home, we can take heart. As we come to understand that we live in the goodness of God, we increasingly find that inspiration, security, and liberation are right at hand.