Drove home today from Peachtree City under a beautiful clear blue morning sky, sun kissed and cloud free. Spent five glorious days with the grandchildren. Hard to believe Alexander is driving himself and Emerson to high school each day. Those sixteen years passed swiftly. Been sitting in the swing on the porch this afternoon. The brown magnolia leaves are running down the street in a symphony of percussion, sounds like a bunch of young boys playing tag, their canvas tennis shoes slapping on the concrete pavement. A loud lonely train horn disrupts the magnolia leaf symphony and when all is quiet I can hear the soft wind chime tintinnabulation riding the quiet cool breeze. I’m back home in my porch swing church pew sitting in the warm Monday afternoon sunshine.

Saw a beautiful Georgia sunset yesterday as twilight swept across the landscape and the sky began to color, three serges of migrating cranes trumpeting noisily made their paths across the heavens. My Alabama yard is full of my songbird friends this afternoon. The male cardinals are almost fluorescent in their deep crimson plumage. Mr. Downy Woodpecker, crisply dressed in his black and white checked sport coat, is perched upside down is on the suet basket enjoying an afternoon snack. Two doves, dressed in their velvet gray dresses and pink high heels, are prissing around under the feeders. The noisy raspberry finches are all over the yard squabbling with each other. I’ve enjoyed watching them on the bird camera feeder. God colored the finches’ plumage in a myriad of raspberry colored watercolors. They are so beautiful. The timid little chickadees and titmice are snatching a sunflower every now and then when the coast is clear, quickly flying away to crack the seed open on a branch.

It’s such a feeling of peace to come home after being away. They say home is where the heart is but I think our heart is our home. In the song Home is Where the Heart Is the last stanza says, “For home is where my heart is and my heart is anywhere you are. Anywhere you are is home.” Our families are our home and our hearts. God is our home, too. We’re protected in his arms, safe with his unconditional love. He helps carry our burdens and gives us peace. God says he’s our refuge and our shelter. Jesus said in John 14:23, “If anyone loves me, he will keep my word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him.”

We are God’s house. God dwells in us, in our hearts where we hold our love, our faith, and our thanksgiving for him. God should be a permanent guest in our house, welcomed by our words, our actions, and our deeds that honor him. To dwell in God’s house we should always be conscious of his presence in our lives.

“The happiest Christian homes I know are those given to hospitality, where neighbors feel at home, where young people are welcome, where the elderly are respected, where children are loved.” — Billy Graham.