Fall is by far my favorite time of year. I think that feeling stands for 99% of Americans. The weather is perfect, the leaves become beautiful, football is playing in the living room, there are PUMPKINS! everywhere you look. (I love pumpkins).
Fall is my least favorite time of year. I can't go a day without thinking about home. See, winter is easy. Every morning that I wake up and my car isn't lost in the snow and it's above 34 degrees, it's a good morning and one that I am thankful to be in Arkansas instead of Iowa. But fall is rough.
Fall sometimes goes by the alias of "Harvest." A word that makes me think of INDIANS! (I love Indians) and pilgrims and farmers of course. Harvest is the best time of year in Iowa. It's usually 'light jacket weather.' The crops are all in, so the fields are empty. I can just feel it. My worn blue jeans, my soft jacket, hair in a pony tail, the wind nipping at my face (not freezing my skin off), running through the bare fields, being careful not to trip on a stray corn stalk. Heading for the pond with my cousins, to throw rocks, or shoot guns, or fish, or on a rare occasion...touch the electric fence.
One day we were bored so we went to the top of the hill and stood in a row, holding hands, while the leader oh so cautiously tapped the electric fence. Then giggled with joy and screamed with pain as the shock flowed through each of us. Only to find out later we were just mere yards from the source head and lucky to be alive. Maybe that's why were all smart, we zapped electricity through our souls.
I could go on all day, literally, telling stories about my family.
The other reason I love fall is because usually everyone comes home. I mean the two families that actually moved out of state. My family goes back about 5 times a year, we're addicts. My uncle Grant lives in Arizona, he likes to come home in the fall. And that's why fall is so great, we're ALL together, all of us, my whole family. That's when everything feels right, when I can finally feel at home.
If you can't tell from my previous blogs, I have an unhealthy obsession with Iowa and my family. I mean there's love and then there's an obsessive need. It's not good because apparently it isn't going to last forever. Which is weird because it's all I've ever known. But people will pass, land will get sold, things that are now won't be in the future. Then my platform of need will shatter and my heart will probably be broken.
In Iowa there is love, happiness, wealth, health, joy, peace, gentleness. When I'm having a bad day at work, or at school or I'm mad at someone, I go to Iowa in my mind. Sometimes it takes everything in me to stop myself from just going there and getting away from my situations. It's like a safety net.
We all have safety nets. People or places we turn to, long for when we're having a hard time. Our homes, a boyfriend/girlfriend, a husband/wife/fiance, memories of a deceased loved one. We're all looking for the same thing. Love, comfort, safety.
We're all looking for the same thing because we were all made by the same Creator. We're longing for and trying to create things and situations that are abundant in His Kingdom.
John 18:36
Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, my servants would fight to prevent my arrest by the Jews. But now my kingdom is in another place."
His Kingdom isn't in Iowa. Although, we often long for our earthly homes, they are not the true source of comfort.
Think about this though, you don't desire things unless you already know what they are like. We long for things we've known.
Jeremiah 1:5
"Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I set you apart."
We've known God's Kingdom. That's why we desire it, because we've had it. Its weird huh. Our earthly minds only remember and have knowledge of here, of earth. But we've had God's Kingdom, we've been there, we've known it. Or we wouldn't all be longing for the same things, longing for the Kingdom, longing for the comfort and the safety net we've already known.
Think about it like this: I long for Iowa, because I've been there because I've known it, because it's my home. I don't long for California the way I long for Iowa. I've never been there, I don't know what it's like. I've heard things about it, but that's not enough to give me the same kind of longing for it.
Alright, so what can we do? We have this desire for His Kingdom, but we're stuck on earth.
Luke 17:20-21
Once, having been asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come Jesus replied, "The kingdom of God does not come with your careful observation, 21 nor will people say, "Here it is," or "There it is," because the kingdom of God is within you."
Revelation 1:6
...and has made us to be a kingdom...
You can quit searching, if you're saved you have the kingdom of God. Right there in the red letters, it is within you. Cool huh. You just have to access it, tap into it. Let God fill those longings. And don't worry because you are not alone. We are all after it, because we were all made by Him. His Kingdom is in you, He is in you. Seek that and you will not be disappointed.
Ever since I figured out I was seeking Iowa the way I should be seeking the Kingdom, God has filled my life with joy and peace, contentment and health. Everything that I once sought in Iowa and my family I now have overflowing inside of me and I am 526 miles away from them.
Acknowledge the earthly place or thing you treat as the Kingdom, seek God and He will fill your safety net far more than anything this world has to offer.
