The house would soon be gone. It would be removed to accommodate a new building for the church. I requested to have one last tour of  the building before it was torn down. A few weeks ago, on a cold January day, I did.

The house was not the same at all. It was cold. It stood empty. So unlike when I lived there. Then it was always active. With people coming and going. Good smells like bread baking. The aroma of pork roast in the oven. Each Christmas, Mom would invite all of the people in the church to come to the house for an Open House. She’d baked dozens of cookies. Of course, we helped her, but she was the force behind the entertainment. This was a busy house.

I walked in the front door where there was once a large room with the dining area on one end and the living room on the other, there was an ugly wall dividing the large room. It didn’t look anything like the home I remembered growing up in. The opening of a once red brick fireplace, was blocked off. They’d painted the red bricks white. Where the lovely dining room with a large, arched mirror and built in china closet, was gone. I walked past what once held a built-in dinette with bright red leather-like upholstery. Gone. Many nights I sat there, doing my homework. The kitchen looked mostly the same. So did the bedrooms. Empty of course.

When I lived there, it was a parsonage where I grew up. I moved into the house with my family at age twelve. I left the house at age 19 as a young bride.

Every time we drove on the road where the house sat, I’d point out the three windows on the upstairs level where my bedroom was. “There’s my room,” I’d say to whomever was in the car, usually my husband. In that room, I dreamed. I planned. I cried. I prayed.

I wish I could show you a photo of what it once looked like, so bright in my memory. But I can’t.

After touring the building one last time before it was gone, I felt satisfied. It wasn’t what it once was anyway.

What I realized were the memories of that life in the house were the most important. And they’re still there, fresh in my mind. The voices. The smells.

One day, I’ll be gone. And those memories with me. But it’s all right. I know my heavenly home will have a new interior. Probably not like the homes I lived in growing up and as an adult, but new and special.

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me. 2 My Father’s house has many rooms; if that were not so, would I have told you that I am going there to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.4 You know the way to the place where I am going” (John 14:1-4 NIV).

Each day grows closer to the time where I will leave this earth. My body will go to a plot that’s already been purchased in the cemetery near that house that will no longer stand. But my spirit, will go to my new home where I will live eternally. It will be more beautiful than I can even imagine.

As a very young child, I’d learned that God holds the answers to whatever problems I might face in life. My parents taught me right from the beginning that God loved me and wanted to have a personal relationship with me.

If you haven’t asked for God’s forgiveness and invited him into your heart and life you can say a simple prayer like this:

Father,

I believe that you did send your son, Jesus, to die for my sins. Please forgive me of those sins. From now on, I will trust you to guide me through each day of my life.

Thank you Father for hearing my prayer. Thank you for beginning a relationship with me. I pray this in Jesus name. Amen.

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Just for fun, enjoy the song.