I best was able to relate it to our journey on the Africa Mercy, docked here in Conakry. Before Kate and I came here we both moved out of our apartments. When we come back to the US we will essentially be homeless.
A couple quick things as I use this word:
I understand that homelessness is a real and worldwide issue, I am not trying to make light of this, it is simply a word used to say we currently don’t have a place to call home.
I also am aware that we are blessed in both having families that would take us in in a heartbeat and that I still consider my parent’s house home as Kate considers her parent’s house her home. But it is not our home.
Now that that’s out of the way, I can better explain my point. We are homeless and yet here on the ship we find a temporary home. We have a bed, we have food, but it is not our home. When we come back to the states we will make a home for ourselves, but right now the ship is a placeholder home. The same is true with the Holy Spirit. The Holy Spirit is our placeholder home until we are redeemed. We are not yet redeemed and therefore are homeless, we have the Holy Spirit to comfort us and has promised us a home, and when we are redeemed we will have a home: in heaven with Christ.
So this begs the question. When are we redeemed? When is the day of redemption mentioned in Ephesians 4:30?
The answer is not cutout and fully known, but it is speculated and it is hoped in. Pay attention to that key word hope later on. Here is what I have found to be the answer:
“In him we have redemption though his blood… he made known to us the mystery of his will… which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times reach their fulfillment – to bring unity to all things in heaven and on earth under Christ.”
- Ephesians 1:7-10
“But God will redeem me from the realm of the dead; he will surely take me to himself.”
- Psalm 49:15
So then are we redeemed when we die or when He brings unity to all things in heaven and earth? This, I am not sure about. What I do know, however, is that with the Holy Spirit as our seal and our guarantee, we are protected and saved unto the unity of heaven and earth and redeemed from death in its finality.
This is where faith comes into play. Faith is “confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see.” Hebrews 11:1. Hope. So faith is hope and assurance in what we do not see. Can we see the afterlife? Can we see our redemption? Can we see when heaven meets earth? No. So we have faith and we hope in our eternity. How foolish am I, to believe and hope in something that is not even tangible? Romans 8:24-25 puts this in a beautiful way:
“For in this hope we were saved. But hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what they already have? But if we hope for what we do not yet have, we wait for it patiently.”
Hope in itself is impossible if you already have that which you hope for. Therefore faith is also pointless if you have everything and know everything that is known. If this world is all that there is and we can see and know all that exists in our tangible and physical universe, then we are truly in a hopeless state. Take one look around you at the world and the pain and suffering that it brings so vibrantly into our lives at the drop of a hat. How can something that can just as easily be gained as it can be lost be our purpose in life? A car – a wreck, a house – a fire, finances – bankruptcy, a loved one – a funeral. Truly, if this world is all that we have, then Solomon said it best:
“’Meaningless! Meaningless!’ Says the Teacher. ‘Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless.’”
- Ecclesiastes 1:2
Or more popularly known:
“I have seen all the things that are done under the sun; all of them are meaningless, a chasing after the wind.”
“I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and indeed, all is vanity and grasping for the wind.”
- Ecclesiates 1:14
Solomon goes on to list nearly every pleasurable thing on earth. Being the king and one of the wealthiest men to have lived, he was able to try out everything he could think of to make himself happy. Even after all that, the meaning of life was still lost on him. If even all of the good that this world has to offer cannot sustain someone, imagine how much more it can tear you apart when you throw all of the bad into the mix as well. It is no mystery that people suffer from a feeling of pointlessness and purposelessness. So if we cannot wish and hope of the things seen, then my next logical step is to hope in the things unseen. C.S. Lewis puts it well:
"If I find myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."
- C.S. Lewis