God sees our homes as holy and sacred. The people of those homes may be different but the importance of home is not. In the Garden of Eden, Adam was given the job of naming all of the animals, birds, and insects, but he asked God for mate for himself. God created the perfect mate and companion for Adam by taking one of Adam’s ribs to make Eve.
Thew family was God’s idea from the very beginning in that a man and a woman will leave their homes and will cleave to one another, forming a perfect union. When you step into the home of this perfect union, you are entering a sacred place. As long as God is welcomed into this sacred place and the couple keeps Him central to all the family does, He will create peace and hope in that dwelling place.
What often destroys marriages is the expectations of the couple that go unmet, as well as the difficulties and storms they may face without having faith as their core value. When each partner goes to God and asks for their own forgiveness, He offers forgiveness of the couple. Marriage is holy and unchangeable; to seek forgiveness is to ask Him to heal our brokenness. We may think that ministers marry couples, but only God does that. Just as Christ died on a cross for our sins and rose again on Easter morning, God gives us “a second chance” to put peace and hope back into our homes. Peace, hope, and love are glue for our families to heal as we work together to make our homes the sacred places they need to be.
Why talk about the sacredness of our homes at Christmas? I do so because I am the benefactor of a mother and father who taught me faith as my first core value. Peace, hope, and love were the results of this faith. There is no better time for me to remember their love than at Christmas. When I think of home, my sacred place, I think of my father’s parishes and how my mother was a big part of his successes. Every time I hear the Christmas song, “I’ll Be Home for Christmas,” the tug of so many beautiful memories flood my mind like a ceaseless waterfall, and my tears fall freely like a gentle stream. I can feel God’s presence as I pen these words because the love that filled my parents’ homes fills my home now. In the words of my mother and father, my home is a sacred place because God has never left it, nor me. With lights on the tree, mistletoe hanging in the hallway, cookies baking, and the smells of a turkey dinner wafting through my sacred place, I know I’ll be home if only in my memories and in my dreams.
Anna Hartt
