How does it feel to be home?

The most frequently asked question I am getting these days is "how does it feel to be home?" followed by "do you know what you will be doing yet?" These are seemingly easy questions on the surface but I find myself fumbling for an answer every time - especially to the first one. How does it feel to be home? Honestly it feels strange. A friend told me that living overseas (for whatever reason) ruins you. I am seeing that that is true. While Ghana never felt entirely like home, being "home" in the US doesn't feel like home either. I remember very well going through this same thing when we returned from seven years in Liberia in 1980. It is challenging to come back and live where you are supposed to be at "home" but it doesn't really feel like home. Don't get me wrong, I am enjoying many things - seeing family and friends, eating at favorite restaurants, driving on good roads and looking at amazing scenery, drinking from the faucet, electricity all the time, an amazingly fast internet, etc. etc. - but deep down I feel disconnected. I feel like I am standing on slippery sand and haven't quite got my feet under me yet. I am in limbo. Maybe that is the problem more than anything else. It seems at this moment that pretty much everything in my life is up in the air. While on one hand that brings a surge of excitement at all the possibilities, it seems that most mornings I wake up with my mind racing and feeling a slight panic that nothing is nailed down. Ah the joys of major transition and the unknown.

I started this post about a week ago and am adding to it just tonight (7/22). I was out-of-town so I haven't written in awhile. The above is still true although I am feeling more "steady" than I was when I originally wrote that. Nope, nothing has really changed - except my focus. While at my friend's house in NC this past weekend I spent a lot of time talking with her about trust in God - for the now and the future. My focus had been on me, my circumstances, my feelings, etc. Not that these things don't matter to some degree but when they are the focus for me, fear and doubt and worry are not far behind. I actually have friends on both sides of the Atlantic reminding me to keep my focus on the Lord and His amazing love for me. He holds my future in His completely capable and trustworthy hands. That is where my focus belongs and that is what I am focusing on:) It is a daily battle - sometimes a minute by minute battle- to be still and let the Lord do what only He can do and leave the future to Him. I am so thankful for His love and power. And grateful to the Lord for people who care and keep me pointed in the right direction.