This world is not my home, I’m just a-passin’ through.” – Jim Reeves³

As we were in one of the hardest seasons of life and seeking God through a devotional on 1 Peter, our pastor at church started a sermon series on the same book in the Bible. Do you think God was trying to say something? Among other things, it was a reminder that we should not be surprised at the trials and wilderness we were going through.

f you read the first verse in 1 Peter you see Peter is writing to the “elect exiles of the dispersion.” In Greek, they were called the diaspora. It may sound like a weird type of fungus, but in fact they were followers of Christ, spread across the Roman Empire due to persecution. It’s here, the preacher reminded us, that we are just like them. Just like we read in the devotion “God’s people are a people of the wilderness.”¹ We see this idea all throughout scripture. Starting when Adam and Eve were sent out from the garden, because of their sin, from then on we’ve been exiles in a foreign land. God continued to remind us of this through scripture when He called Abraham out from his homeland. We see where the Israelites were often displaced and enslaved, and in the New Testament we are shown through the Christians in the dispersion that this world is not our home. It’s all transient, temporary.

In my early 20’s I traveled to Central America. As soon as I stepped out of the airport, the culture shock hit me like a wall. The air smelled and felt different, the noise and chaos even in the middle of the night was like nothing I had experienced before. Never had I felt more out of place.

Even if you have never left the country we are sure that there is a time you have felt the same way. In John 15 verse 19, Jesus reminds us that when we become followers of Christ, this is how we’ll feel on this earth. We were “chosen” out of this world. It is no longer our home. We are “the dispersed” the diaspora. We should not be surprised by this or the struggles that come in the wilderness of our lives. (1 Peter 4:12)

Have you ever seen someone who was out of place and made it known? Maybe they caused more problems than there would have been just because of their reaction? I learned a long time ago there are people that I will and will not travel with, because there is nothing worse than a person loudly complaining about how annoying it is that people do not speak English in another country, or saying how “weird” something is. Did you know that how we respond when we are “out of place” says a lot about who we are? We can say the same thing about the way that we live in this foreign land. Do we loudly complain about the things we do not like that make us uncomfortable? Maybe it is the people that do not understand the way that we do things, and we do not like the way that they do things. We cannot expect them to live like they are headed for a different land when they are not. Do we grumble about the living conditions always wanting the bigger and the better, the more when all of these things will not last? (Matthew 24:35) Or do we hold onto things loosely, knowing that the important things are the eternal things? Do we have joy in the wilderness because we know it is not the end? By His grace, the grace that He gives us in the wilderness, in the exile, in the diaspora, we can be good travelers.

My travels in Central America were very difficult and I wasn’t even there that long. Many things didn’t go as planned. Watching the lizards each evening in the shower, making sure they did not get too close was not something I would care to repeat. Besides teaching or translating three classes each day, my body did not respond well to the local food. Every night I went to bed tired, physically, emotionally, and spiritually. Each day I longed for the start of the next morning, knowing it was one day closer to going home.

Psalm 130 talks about the watchmen that wait for the morning to come. We can relate. We have spent many a night up with a sick kid or family member just waiting, watching for that sun to rise. Sometimes we wait for the morning to come to shine a light into whatever darkness is going on in our lives. With each morning that comes, we are reminded in Lamentations that we are given new mercies and grace for each day. He is faithful and He will do it. (3:23-24)

This is how we can be like those mentioned in Hebrews 11, the ones who knew that they were strangers here (verse 13). Through God’s grace can we get up each day, knowing that there is more than this (verse 10), and keep journeying to that homeland (verse 14). Let us keep on, not looking back to what was once our home, but going forward to the place being prepared for us. (verse 16) Yes, we are the diaspora, strangers in a strange land, but as the song says, “we’ll press on towards that blessed shore” because “praise the Lord, we’re almost home.”⁴

³ Reeves, Jim. “This World is Not my Home.” This World is Not My Home. RCA Victor, 1962. record.

⁴ Papa, Matt. “Almost Home.” Almost Home. Getty Music, 2021. CD.