GO:
Sometimes welcome is a place: the houses we've lived in, our parents' homes, our kids' homes, our friends' homes, our church, restaurants where they recognize us.
Sometimes welcome is an indescribable feeling, a certain something that I find, especially in reading very good writing. I felt welcomed into Madeleine L'Engle's world, even though I didn't know her. Fred Buechner, Eugene Peterson, Anne Lamott, lots of the bloggers I'm discovering lately. It's something in the word choice, the style, the je ne sais quoi - I'm invited to share something special, something almost sacred, something I can't name or even define very well. But I know it when I find it.
But mostly welcome is people: first of all, people who know me well and love me anyway. But there are others, too. Some of the people I'm coming to know through blogging, some of the people I meet in the daily comings and goings of my life. A lot of the people in the church where we regularly worship. And also some of the people at churches where we've been visiting this year - that's wonderful to find, wonderful to experience.
What I am learning about this God we serve is that WELCOME is almost equivalent to a name, a definition for who God is. As I read scripture and as I walk this life as a follower of Jesus, I am finding more and more doors opening, hearing more and more cries of long-lost recognition, feeling more and more like I'm home. So I have to ask - do I offer that welcome well to others? Oh, I hope so.
STOP
