Welcomed Home

Yesterday I visited a childhood home. Not the house where we lived, but the church I grew up attending. According to my mother, when I was five years old, she had taken me to visit several Episcopal churches near our new home. When we visited St. Matthew’s, the minister greeted me by getting down to my level and saying, “Welcome, Melissa. I am so glad you are here,” I looked up at my mother and said, “This is our church, Mommy.”

Now, over sixty years later, I often find myself longing for some of what first began to draw my heart towards God at St. Matthew’s so many years ago– the reverence, the beauty of the liturgy, the deeply meaningful music, and the warm welcome.

Wednesday morning this week, feeling a need for some of those means of grace, I drove the 45 minutes to St. Matthew’s for the midweek service. Entering the church, I felt awkward and a bit shy– I had never been to the midweek service, and I knew none of the small group of parishioners gathered in the sanctuary before the service. But when I walked in a women came to me with a smile, took my hands, looked me in the eyes, and said, “Welcome, I am so glad you are here.” When I told her who I was, she was exclaimed with delight and announced to everyone that I was my parents’ daughter come back to St. Matthew’s. I felt as though Jesus himself was welcoming me into his house.

Interestingly, the day before I visited St. Matthew’s I had read the Parable of the Prodigal Son (Luke 15:11-32), in which the father warmly welcomed his wandering son home. Each time I read the parable a different aspect of it catches my attention, and this week it had been the warmth of the father’s welcome that I had been drawn to so, though not returning as a prodigal, I found it particularly meaningful that I received such a warm welcome.

After the service I took to the woods –yet another “home” that feeds my soul. I’ve always found solace and refreshment in woods, savoring solitude, and the spacious feeling of being out in God’s creation; I often feel more at home in woods than anywhere else. I meandered along trails, climbed on rocks, reveled in the sights and sounds of nature, sat in silence and sketched. As it tends to, sketching quieted my mind, drawing me into a deeper awareness of my longing for God and into quiet prayer, simply enjoying being in his presence.

Now I am home in our woods, where I love to meander along our trails, sometimes stopping to sketch, sometimes just sitting in silence on a fallen tree. I often close my day in prayer in those chairs by the stream or one of many little nooks where I can quiet my soul and be reminded of God’s ever welcoming love. Thank you, Lord, for the many “homes” where you have grown and nurtured my soul and where you continue to welcome me to walk or sit and simply be with you.