Did he know what was coming?
Did he have any idea? If he didn’t, how could he hold out that long? How did he endure?
It’s been 5 months since I began traveling. It’s been 5 months since I packed up and gave up any concept of “home” I had acquired over the last three years. It’s been Chicago, Atlanta, Germany. It’s been Denver, Portland, Seattle. It’s been Boise, Indianapolis, Salem, Lincoln, Boston, and a hundred places between.
My life has been that of a nomad.
While many have looked upon my travels with envy or excitement, it should be known that there is a significant difference between being a traveler and being a nomad. While these experiences have been rich in love, relationship, and Kingdom work, they begin to demand a cost from a guy’s soul that is difficult to pay.
The last few weeks of my travels have been mixed with a deep sense of anxiety, similar to that of culture shock. It’s a displacement anxiety, a rootedness complex. It’s a psychological cry for help, telling me that this is not right and that I cannot sustain this existence. And I hear this cry, and know that I must endure a few months still.
So I’ve asked for help to endure. One of my older Christian friends told me that I needed to spend some time with the biblical Abraham, the father of the Jewish people.
This man knew something about being a nomad. One day he was minding his own business and he received this call from the heavens, telling him that he must leave all that he knew and if he did, he would become a “blessed” man.
And so He left. He traveled and had hick ups along the way, but he went to the place that he was asked to go. He trusted God and then became a pretty important man in the history of the world. That’s how the story normally is told. That’s how I thought it went.
As I read this story again, I began to notice that his movement did not stop with the one trek across the Middle East. This idea of movement, of being an alien, was a running theme through his life. He was always having to go somewhere else. He didn’t own land. He didn’t get to have the good Middle Eastern Dream of kids and cattle and land, at least not for a long time.
Abraham was crying out to God, unsure of what blessing could come from this desolate, seemingly futureless lifestyle… and God tells him to not be afraid, and to hold out longer.He kept going, with a promise that God was doing good things. Somewhere through the story, it appears that he began to lose his way, because God gives him another shout out from heaven with a promise: “Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be great.”
But I’ll still believe / though there’s cracks you’ll see / When I’m on my knees I’ll still believe // And when I’ve hit the ground / neither lost nor found / If you believe in me, I’ll still believe.
He had a son. He eventually was allowed to buy some land, but only to bury his wife. He ventured on, moving when told and fighting for the promise.
He carried on.
But the real blessing for his faithfulness did not come in his lifetime. He never got to see the reward.
And his story does not feel so distant to me right now. Five months is hardly worth comparing to fifty years of travel. If anything, it scares me to think that the one trip to Canaan was hardly the end of Abraham’s nomadic life.
But today, he shows me that some things are worth enduring.
“Leave your country, your people, and your father’s household… Don’t be afraid… I am your shield… your reward shall be great.”
“Not one of these people, even though their lives of faith were exemplary, got their hands on what was promised. God had a better plan for us: that their faith and our faith would come together to make one completed whole, their lives of faith not complete apart from ours.”
Still wandering,
Tony