I said bye to a close friend on Friday, as he drove off he said out his car window “Don’t forget you’re American.” I think what he meant to say, in a roundabout bro way, was that I would be missed. There may have been a slight fear of how much we would change during this time but I think it was mostly about remembering the people and the places that I now call home and to hurry back. I waved as I thought about being away for two years and all that would change.
This statement got me thinking though… Am I an American first? Is this where I strive to come home to? And is being an American what motivates my work in Africa?
What does the Bible say about our citizenship?
13 All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance, admitting that they were foreigners and strangers on earth. 14 People who say such things show that they are looking for a country of their own. 15 If they had been thinking of the country they had left, they would have had opportunity to return. 16 Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. (Hebrews 11:13-16)
My flight overseas leaves tomorrow evening. From there I will be in a completely foreign country for the following two years. But shouldn’t we always be foreigners, shouldn’t we always be motivated by our true citizenship? If I come back to the U.S. after these two years or if I live in some far away land shouldn’t I long for my true country and my citizenship purchased by Christ’s blood?
These verses paradoxically makes leaving both easier and harder. It is hard to leave because there are so many people who I long to continue to know and grow with. So many who I will miss and because if I live for my true citizenship I don’t know how those relationships will change in the future. If I was an American above all else, I know where I would desire to be and what country I would work to return to but I am not. If I knew where I would be and if I determined the path ahead of me, it would be easier but I don’t. It will be hard to leave but it is so much easier to leave knowing that these aren’t two years away from home but a new season in my lifelong journey home. I’m not missing out on anything. There is no comparing anything that I give up now to following God’s path for me, no loss that can’t be made whole in my eternal home, and no joy more undeserved then the possibility to be used by God to lead brothers and sisters home, either in Africa or wherever I am called to be a foreigner next—In the U.S. or elsewhere.