Moving to a new state, in fact to what seems like a whole new part of the world, means leaving behind many loved ones, regular routines, important responsibilities, and familiar places. That is hard to do... But it also means searching for God's call in the new place and with new people--something that can be both hard and rewarding.

For us this has meant a call to spend time with a daughter, son-in-law and grandhild--a gift and a joy that we are making the most of! But there is almost always more than family to God's call, and we continue to seek the other parts. So this past week has been spent on one that we know is part of this new stage in life, the mundane but important task of making a house into a home.

The home we bought is just right for us: small, functional, near the kids, and in an extremely pleasant setting. But it looks like it had been used as a short-term rental and was prepared to sell by a surface treatment. The result is a house with plenty of cretive possibilities--and because it is not a large house those possibilities are not onerous but an achievable challenge. Beides that, we have moved to the furniture capital of the world (near us is Furnitureland South, the world's largest furniture store), so furnishing our home (we brought nothing with us except pieces of furniture that fit well in Emily's house) should be interesting.



Through our real estate agent we made contact with a retired engineer who drives a school bus and does home repair projects. So all last week Roy and Will attacked several small projects and one semi-major one, one of the two bathrooms. When I was a kid my weekend gardening job sometimes expanded into working alongside the homeowner on various tasks. Later as a homeowner myself out of necessity I gradually learned many of the skills necessary for keeping a house going and even improving it. So many of the tasks Roy and I are doing are not new to me, but this time there are two differences: when we left Shoreline I got rid of almost all my tools and I am committed to not collecting them all over again and I have time... Instead of squeezing in the tasks a bit at a time, late at night or on my one day off a week, I can start a task and keep at it until it is finished. That feels like a luxury--and it is.

Now I know that the physical condition of a house does not make it a home in the sense that God defines a home. Sadly, I have known many people whose houses are in excellent condition, outfitted with the newest furnishings and assembled with the finest of taste--but which are more like museums than homes. For these people a house is a fortress, reserved for the pleasure of the owner and, perhaps, a few select others. But to God a house is a tool for ministry, and for most people the most valuable tool they have. Part of that ministry is for the owner--it is a place of security and comfort. But that is not the whole. If a house is a gift from God, then it is given to be used in ministry to others as well as for the one to whom it is given. And I believe that a house truly becomes a home not when the owners feel most satisfied with it, but when God feels most satisfied with the way in which it is being used for him.

What this means to me is that while this time for me is a time to work on the physical aspects of the house God has given us, that work needs to be done with a thought to what the house can be used for in the totality of God's call to Nancy and me. The sophistication and fineness of a house is not the issue, after all a stable once was a house for the most important birth ever to take place. The issue is the availability of the resource called house to the work of God, that is what makes it a home. The work for those blessed enough to own it, and the work through them to others.

In the end, the accountability that God will hold us to includes the use of the gifts he has given us. For most of us one of those gifts is a house, so the question before each of us is the same as that for any gift, how was my house a home? That is, how did I use it not only for myself but for fulfilling the unique call to serve that God gave me?