Moving Into God’s House

  By Marcy Barthelette

Your potential is the sum of all the possibilities God has for your life. Charles Stanley

I love moving. My history attests to that statement. If my count is right, I have lived in twenty-three different houses, enjoyed one vacation home, and tested many different types of camping equipment. I relish the hunt for a new place, though I confess that I don’t enjoy home purchase closing procedures; they often drain the joy from the process. I delight in drawing blueprints of where my furnishings and accessories will fit into new spaces. The challenge of logistically bringing all the pieces together gets my juices revving. I even enjoy just dreaming about a new place, drawing floorplans, and as I age, I look at ways to make my footprint smaller, live in less space with less stuff, and just enjoy God’s creation all around me. Tiny home living fascinates my imagination and I’ve drawn plans for very small dwellings, challenging myself to find space for all the things I need along with some of my favorite creature comforts, always increasing my living area by incorporating lots of outdoor space.

I’d love to begin the search for a new home today. My mind is definitely up to the challenge but my body may not be as willing to cooperate. So, I’ve been going about the business of making small changes in my current home. Decluttering has been a major goal in recent weeks. We’ve emptied closets and drawers, pantry and laundry room, searching for anything that needs to leave. Those items have been bagged and donated to worthy causes. Then comes the task of finding innovative new ways to store away the things that don’t need to be seen and effectively displaying treasures that offer clues to who we are. In a way, we are moving without changing our physical address. We can attain a feeling of newness without the hassle of packing, unpacking, and dealing with movers. We can create new small areas within our home to accommodate our hobbies and interests and we can improve our outdoor space with new appointments that reflect our love of nature.

Moses prayed: Lord, you have been our home since the beginning. Psalm 90:1

Several times recently, I’ve heard it said that we should move into God’s house and I’ve pondered what that would look like. A physical move here on earth involves collecting and filling many boxes and, if needed, contracting a moving company, contacting the Post Office to make the address change, arranging to disconnect one group of utility services and connect another, cleaning and polishing two residences, one for yourself and the other for someone new. We leave a well-used comfortable environment to arrive in unfamiliar surroundings. Yes, we become somewhat familiar with the neighborhood just by spending a few moments here or there during the process, but it takes living in that new home to really get acquainted with it and with the people surrounding us. Familiarity typically equates with comfort, of one sort or another.  What will it be like moving in with God?

I’m asking Yahweh for one thing, [David] wrote, only one thing: to live with him in his house my whole life long. I’ll contemplate his beauty, I’ll study at his feet. That’s the only quiet secure place in a noisy world. Ps. 27:4–5 MSG

How will our new living space look and feel or will there be a designated space at all? Will our bodies require food and water or will there be nobody as we know it? We are told there will be no pain but is that because our bodies no longer exist? We know everything will be different but we’re not sure exactly what that means. So God has given us the opportunity right here on earth to take those first steps toward moving in with Him. He sent His Word to us through believers of the past and He expects us to spend time with the Word in quiet contemplation. He keeps the line of communication always open. We can call upon Him at any hour and expect to be heard. Prayer is such an easy thing and yet we try to make it hard. Just to immerse ourselves in conversation with Him — that’s all He asks. He provides for our needs, not necessarily our wants, but always our absolute needs. Unfortunately, we don’t always recognize the difference. Once again, we return to the inevitable freedom of choice that is a constant in our lives. Will we choose correctly and move into a space that offers comfort from the chaos of the world or will we stumble blindly in the darkness around us, never feeling the hand of God at work in our spirits? Of all the moves we will make in our lifetimes, this is the only one that really matters … this move determines our eternity!

LORD, I love the Temple where you live, where your glory is. PSALM 26:8


One Response to “Moving Into God’s House”

  1. Doug Gensler says:

    Hi Marcy!

    We always enjoy your arcticles but this one hit home BIG TIME! We’ve moved multiple times in our thirty-six years of marriage. First a duplex for a year and a half then we built our first home and two years later our much larger second home and two years later our much larger third “Dream Home” then we bought a vacation property on Table Rock lake that had two cabins that we remodeled then sold them six years later, Five years after that we bought another lake house on Table Rock and fixed-up it up, then a few years later we decided to move to our lake home so we sold our “Dream home” in Nixa that we had lived in for twenty-three years and drastically down-sized and in an effort to “simply” our lifestyle. We remodeled the lake house and had a brand-new private dock built and then we decided to sell the place and did so this past August— because in all honesty our lifestyle had become more complicated than simplified due to various “life” circumstances that put us on the road back and forth to Springfield for many hours several days a week. Truth is, we didn’t care much for living at the lake full-time. It took the away the “getaway” feel.

    We found and bought an older mostly up-to-date smaller home in south Springfield and down-sized again! Over the years we filled up three car garages, a thirty by forty barn and multiple storage units. That is, until the last three years when we began to get rid of tons of stuff! I had a few classic trucks and a car and I’m down to just one of those now. Also sold my bass boat and our Tri-toon. We going to rent boats from now on. We’re going to rent cabins on the lake and leave all of the work and worry to the owners!

    We’ve finally whittled most of the non-essentials down to just the things we need to live and the items we use and enjoy for recreation. We sold some stuff but mostly donated to worthy causes. It was a painful process at first but it got easier as we went along especcally since I was a certified pack- rat! I’m also a do-it yourself-er that’s saddled with a heavy-dose of sentimental DNA! Point is, if I can do it anybody can!!! My wife Julie and I had to make some hard choices this year that involved a lot of sacrifices but now that it’s behind us we both feel fantastic! It’s involved a tremendous amount of effort to get to where we are but we’re inching closer to achieving our goal to simply our lifestyle. It’s certainly been a God lead journey for us.

    What struck me the most about your article was how you tied-in the final move into God’s house. Part of my struggle with giving up our lake place at first was resolved through prayer and then by revelation that I/we have a far greater place in Heaven waiting for us. When that hit me I knew what we had to do. I said okay Lord, all would ask is for a place on a lake with a boat and great fishing!

    Thanks & God bless,

    Doug

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