I was born and raised in New Brunswick, Canada, home of the World’s Largest Axe, Highest Tides and Longest Covered Bridge. This small province on the east coast of Canada makes up approximately 1% of Canada and has approximately 750, 000 inhabitants. It is a land of small towns, potato farms and friendly neighbors.
Having grown up there my entire life, I really had no idea what it was like to be homesick until very recently. At the beginning of this summer I moved to central Indiana so I could participate in an internship in a church because I am studying to be a pastor.the church is great the people are friendly but if you have ever moved away from friends and family you know the heartache that comes from being away from those familiar people, places and memories. These feelings start to burn inside you and if you aren’t careful they can dominate your thoughts and affect your attitude and this is what began to happen in my life, until God used my favorite band to challenge my thinking.
“In Exile” by Thrice is a song about being called toward a heavenly kingdom. God has designed the perfect world for us, a place with no suffering or pain, no evil or corruption, a place where even the sin inside ourselves with be taken away and we will live in complete freedom and love for Him and one another. When I think about this, I can no longer get homesick for Atlantic Canada or any other place on this earth. None of it compares to what awaits us in the next life.
As long as we live on this earth, we are wanderers. We never know for certain what tomorrow holds and most of us will be here less than 100 years. Our home and our hope need to be in something greater, something infinitely better, than anything we know right now.
In Exile
