Familiar

When I stepped off the plane a year and a half ago in Rwanda, I remember feeling a unique and overwhelming feeling. Not fear or excitement, nervousness or happiness or shock. It all felt..

familiar.

I looked around and thought I have seen this before. Familiarity breeds comfort and so essentially, it was a deep comfort. I remember right where I stood // looking around, observing, outside the airport in Kigali, surrounded by friends, in a new land. I sighed, I smiled, I felt a warmth inside. Home.

I assumed it felt familiar because my sister had lived in a neighboring African country for two years. I had heard her stories, seen her pictures, lived her life thousands of miles away. So I was somewhat familiar with African culture. I thought that was the all of it // my sister had helped me see another culture and so it felt like home.

Until I lived in Colombia this past week.

It was a different kind of initial observation. It all felt new, more new than Rwanda did, but walking through the streets of Santa Marta, it felt familiar. I felt like I belonged there, that despite not knowing any of the same language, we were the same. We could sit in church every night and sing a cappella together in Spanish and in English and we could be one.

familiar.

I think that feeling is a coming home. Heaven. Natsukashii.

It's our connection to one another // that despite distance and language and socioeconomic status and family and opportunity, we can look each other in the eye and feel at home. We embrace when we can't use words and that presence dissipates distance. We share something in common, something much stronger than anything earthly.

Visiting another culture and experiencing Christ globally always feels like coming home to me. I imagine heaven will feel a little like that // when your world is opened up to include much more of God's people than you ever imagined, people who have been fighting this side of heaven to bring glory to His name. And you'll all get to meet and laugh and hug and look each other in the eye and say, "well done. Well done."

There are so many out there who are loving God and loving people and who believe the same things you do. They live somewhere so different, but when you are given the opportunity to rub shoulders and touch hands and to soak in the beauty of the lives in which they live and do ministry work alongside them, it is a wonder. Refreshing and a comfort.

It is heaven on earth.