This week we read the great story of the missing tortoise, a story with a good deal more to teach about life.
Tallulah the tortoise went on a six month journey - amounting to 350 yards - from her Oxford home to a nearby school. On Homelessness Sunday we ask - when was she homeless?
One answer is never - she carries her home with her! But this wasn't quite as good as it seemed because she had become less than fully fit without the care of her owners.
Another answer is that she became homeless the moment she left the garden via a fox hole. Though it is difficult to argue that if she had returned through the hole the next day. It would have been a day trip rather than homelessness.
A third answer is that she became homeless at the point when her owners gave up looking for her. This seems close to the truth though the microchip they had given her meant that even after they had stopped looking, she was capable of being returned home as she shortly will be.
Homelessness seems to me to be something about having no-one looking out for you - and no microchip. You may have a very nice house and car and fine life or none of these things. But you do not have a home.
It is the inestimable privilege of the child of God that, whether they have gone through an unfortunate fox hole or not, they always have a home. Someone always has them on His heart.
Tallulah the tortoise went on a six month journey - amounting to 350 yards - from her Oxford home to a nearby school. On Homelessness Sunday we ask - when was she homeless?
One answer is never - she carries her home with her! But this wasn't quite as good as it seemed because she had become less than fully fit without the care of her owners.
Another answer is that she became homeless the moment she left the garden via a fox hole. Though it is difficult to argue that if she had returned through the hole the next day. It would have been a day trip rather than homelessness.
A third answer is that she became homeless at the point when her owners gave up looking for her. This seems close to the truth though the microchip they had given her meant that even after they had stopped looking, she was capable of being returned home as she shortly will be.
Homelessness seems to me to be something about having no-one looking out for you - and no microchip. You may have a very nice house and car and fine life or none of these things. But you do not have a home.
It is the inestimable privilege of the child of God that, whether they have gone through an unfortunate fox hole or not, they always have a home. Someone always has them on His heart.
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