strangers

Thinking about what it meant for Abraham’s descendants to “be strangers in a country not their own” (Genesis 15:13). And about what it means to live as perpetual “strangers” in this world. My husband and I spend our lives as “strangers” in a very real, and obvious, way. We are expats—we are a different color from our neighbors, we speak a different language, and we have a different home.
Today, I danced with the lady who cleans the library each day as I close up for the end of school. I had never seen her in anything other than her school cleaner’s uniform, and I gasped when I saw her this afternoon for the first time, before the wedding ceremony began. “Auntie J—you’re beautiful!” I exclaimed. She returned my smile as if it was only fitting that I recognize such a fact. And it was. She is beautiful. And I am sorry—ashamed, rather—to admit that I have never noticed before.
After the meal I held back a bit but soon, as happens, the music drew me onto the dance floor. Instead of joining the center ring, though, I noticed Auntie J off on her own and went to join her. I matched her moves, admiring the fluidity she displayed. For several songs, the two of us smiled and swayed in our own world of motion; then a couple others joined us. That is where I stayed until the party was clearing out and Peter and I also headed home.
Later we talked of how good of a party it was. For us, the major gift of the day was due to the fact that we ended up spending it with a small group of coworkers whom we had spent days with but never shared our lives with. They welcomed us into their partying group today, making sure we joined in on all aspects of their local celebration. We did nothing to merit this inclusion—but there it was, all the same . . . and our lives are just a little bit lighter, and brighter, this evening, as a result.
For us this inclusion is obviously significant. But truthfully, is it not the same for us all, as citizens of the world, yet children of the Father? We are strangers here, all longing to belong, and longing to be included. Sometimes we get tastes of what it feels like to be welcomed in, as we were today. How beautiful to think about a day when this taste will be a banquet—an eternal reality of ultimate inclusion.