Finding Home.
“There’s not a place in our lives that has more power to shape us, to build us up, or to destroy us than home.”
(Elyse Fitzpatrick)
In the movie, “The Wizard of Oz,” the main character, Dorothy, finally returns back home after losing her way inside a tumultuous dream brought about by a tornado. To get home, she simply puts on her magical ruby slippers, clicks her heels, and repeats, “There’s no place like home. There’s no place like home…” Whether you’ve seen the movie or not, you may know about that scene. In real life, people experience “tornadoes” of different sizes and durations that truly devastate their lives. However, they don’t find any magical slippers to bring them where they most long to be–truly home. Thankfully, we can have something infinitely more satisfying–a forever home with God.
The participants at Rewritten come from broken families without fathers. Their hearts are often wounded at an early age, and over time, those wounds have worsened rather than healed as they’ve grown up. Deep hurts and scars are hard to manage while also trying to get through school, endure family difficulties, struggle with relationships, worry about money and security, and ease the pain of abandonment. In many cases, their hearts have bandage after bandage binding them but never making them well. They often ache for “home,” a true and good home where they will be safe, loved, and at peace.
The challenge we have faced and addressed with our young people is to confront the hurt and dysfunction by offering signposts pointing them toward God’s fatherly love for each of us. What He provides is more satisfying than a beautiful house with an intact family. We have often shared with them that an important way to continue moving toward that truer place and wholeness with him, is to watch over their hearts.
In the Bible, Proverbs 4:23-27 encourages protecting one’s heart and offers some ways to do so: “Keep your heart with all vigilance, for from it flow the springs of life. Put away from you crooked speech, and put devious talk far from you. Let your eyes look directly forward, and your gaze be straight before you. Ponder the path of your feet; then all your ways will be sure. Do not swerve to the right or to the left; turn your foot away from evil.” We find in this passage that guarding or protecting one’s heart is extremely important, should be a highest priority, and requires us to partner with God. It’s not all on us, but we play an important role.
Over the past decade, we have consistently provided, through diverse and highly relational support, opportunities to help them to see how essential this is for their lives and for finding that perfect home in God. Among those efforts we recently hosted a workshop with therapist and longtime friend of Rewritten, Francine Sandoval. She shared key aspects of applying this idea to life and explained that guarding our hearts is to protect each of us, like a bodyguard who is active and diligent, and that we partner with God for our good: “God transforms us, and we choose to change…We say ‘yes’ and choose to obey him.” As our father, he helps us to come to him and to live in his peace..
All of us need this. If you are a young woman or young man growing up without a father’s direction in your life, you might be wondering how you could apply this to your life. Here are three areas where you can start guarding your heart. In your intellect, emotions, and spirituality. What you think about, where your feelings are coming from and what spiritual practices you have in place to help steady you, if done by putting God’s Word and wisdom first in your life and replacing what doesn’t come from him with what does, will put you well on your way to finding the peace that only a heart guarded in God’s fatherly love can know.
Fatherlessness has existed from ancient days until now, but in recent decades, it has increased exponentially in the U.S. and in other parts of the world. We live in a complicated and often difficult society. Letting the difficulties of life, large and small, overtake us leads to wounds that never heal. We don’t need ruby slippers, but something much deeper, much more available, and much more fulfilling–we need God himself. It’s our desire to provide signposts for our young people to point them toward Him, to help them get all the way home.