Looking To A Better Country

These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.
Hebrews 11:13-16 (ESV)

One of the things that I know I struggle with, and which it seems many followers of Christ struggle with, is that our affection are much too set on this world. With that in mind these verses caught my attention. They are found in a section of Hebrews that speaks of the faith that exemplified the saints of the past--Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to name a few. The aspect of faith that is examined there is that it looks forward to something that has not yet been received.

Here we read that these people "died in faith." They knew the promise given them. They trusted that it would be fulfilled eventually. They trusted that God would be true to his word. Yet, they did not receive the things promised before they died.

What grabbed my attention was the other phrase used to describe them, "and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth." Part of their dying in faith was not only that they saw the promises from afar even though they did not receive them, but that they realized something far greater, that is, that they and the promises they received and looked toward are not part of the current pattern of this earth. Instead, in faith, they realized that while here they were strangers and exiles. They did not fit with all that was around them because they were looking for something more. They realized that they were strangers and exiles while on this earth.

I think that caught my attention because what I see so often in myself and others around me is the exact opposite. We are obsessed with this earth and the things that are part of it to the point that it is difficult to imagine that we are strangers and exiles. Our hopes so easily become petty things of this earth. What we want to see happen are focused on the hear and now. There is little sense of looking for something more.

But, when one starts to really see themselves as a stranger and exile on the earth because of Jesus Christ, then what the middle part of these verses teach becomes true, "For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one." When we start to realize that the promises we have is far beyond anything this world could ever offer, and we realize that we no longer fit with this world, then it becomes clear that we are looking not for what the world can give, but for what only God can give. We are looking for something better that can only come by God's working. We are looking for a time and place when God will manifest himself in such a way that everything will be transformed completely because of his presence there. Is that not the hope found in places like Revelation 21 were we read,

And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He
will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more,
neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the
former things have passed away.”

Sadly, our hopes are often all too small because we are much to connected and at home in this earth. There is often little or no sense that we are looking for a homeland that is buile by God, because we are to at home in this world that is in rebellion against God.

The final verse calls for you and I to reconsider this comfort on the earth. We read that those who acknowledge they are strangers and exile on the earth, those who make it clear they are looking for a better place from God that is heavenly not earthly, are the sort of people that God is not ashamed to be called their God. If God is not ashamed to be called the God of those who are looking for the city that God has prepared for them, what of you and I who so often are not looking for that city, that country prepared for us by God?

This is a call to realize that true faith makes you a person who is no longer part of this earth. Yes, you live here. Yes, striving for good, peace and the like here is not a bad thing, except when it makes you or I forget that we are strangers and exiles on the earth. May God give us faith that realizes that, faith that lives in such a way that looks to the better country, the city God has prepared for us, where he will dwell with his people forever.