Observation: Paul is giving thanks for his good friends in Thessaloniki (which today is in Greece) where he founded a Christian congregation, but was forced to leave by a group of his fellow Jews who took issue with his message about Jesus as Messiah. Timothy, Paul's protege, has just come back to him with another glowing report about the people's faith, which encourages Paul. Paul hopes aloud that he can see his Thessalonian friends face to face again.
Application: Like Paul, I have moved around a fair bit in my life. Thankfully, I've never been driven out of any town before (at least not yet), but from when I was very young, my family of origin lived a somewhat nomadic life, and as an adult with kids of my own, I've kept the tradition. Of course I can't hold a candle to the military families who find themselves relocating every year or so. But still, in my relatively short life, I've lived in at least six different states, and at least a dozen communities.
This is a double-edged sword, of course: on the one hand, I don't have too many of what I'd call "life long friends." I don't drive home to the house or neighborhood where I was raised, I don't take my kids to the schools I attended, I don't find myself running into high school teachers or kindergarten classmates at the grocery store. I sometimes envy the sense of rootedness in a place that some folks I know have.
But on the other hand, I feel God has blessed me (and hopefully my kids as well) with a more durable sense of what "home" really is: it's where your family resides. It's where the people you care about gather together. It's even something you carry within yourself; a sense of knowing who you are and whose you are in the midst of a changing world.
And to Paul's point, in this month of Thanksgiving, I can genuinely say I can give thanks for true friends in communities all over the place. So if I haven't said it recently, to my friends in Indianapolis, Indiana; Columbus, Ohio; Hartland, Michigan; Libby, Montana; Easton, Catonsville, Urbana, and elsewhere in Maryland; Lake Ann and Traverse City, Michigan; and to friends and family scattered across the world since last we met: please know, I'm thankful to God for you. Your lives have been a light for my journey.
Prayer: God, thank you for friends far and wide. Thank you for my family, who have been and continue to be my true home. Please be with my family this week as we celebrate the loving life of Susie Jahn, my paternal grandmother. Hold her--and us--in your arms always. Amen.
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