Home Sweet Heaven

Today is a public holiday in South Africa so people can vote. We aren't qualified to vote here, but we sure do pray for this nation. The kids were home from school, so I took all three brothers on a hike. I thought about how their dirty little toes had never touched American soil. And how I carry a Texas driver's license, have a Tennessee permanent address, and haven't left South Africa's rich soil in almost 10 years.

We've watched our children grow up in South Africa and navigated signifiant issues here. Over and over again, I've heard about how much America has changed since I left 14 years ago.

There's much I didn't live through in South Africa, parts of life that didn't shape me the way it shaped the people I love here. There's much I don't know about my own country, America. I don't think it would feel like I was "going home" if I took a trip there. My family was born here. But something or someone reminds me I'm not from here daily.

We could feel displaced or foreign wherever I go. But we've taken a different approach.

We are fully American. We fully live in South Africa. And we are citizens of heaven and heaven only. Our children will grow up with a weird fusion of accents and vocabulary. We pray they will also grow up knowing that, every time the world around them doesn't feel like it fits right, it's because they were cut from heaven's mold and they have a glorious hope and future.