The Desire of a Pilgrim

Hebrews 11:15-16 - "And indeed if they had been thinking of that country from which they went out, they would have had opportunity to return. But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared a city for them."

If we didn't catch it reading through the life of Abraham in the book of Genesis, Hebrews chapter 11 makes it very clear that Abraham lived the life of a pilgrim. He was a stranger on this earth seeking a homeland, and not just any homeland, but a heavenly one. He lived his life with an eternal mindset, a focus on things that he could not see. By the way that he lived his life he was confessing that he was a stranger and a pilgrim on the earth.

As a pilgrim he had a very pinpointed desire. He knew what he wanted. According to this passage Abraham, as well as others, desired a heavenly country. And his desire was so strong that the thought of the country from which he went out didn't dwell in his mind. He could have returned to the comfort and security of a house in Er, but he didn't even think about it. Because he knew what he wanted and it wasn't found in any earthly country. He desired a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Verse 10 of Hebrews chapter 11 says of Abraham - "for he was looking for a city which has foundations, whose architect and builder is God." He was looking for a permanent city, a city with foundations, that was built by God Himself. Is that your desire? As strangers and pilgrims on this earth our desire should be for a better country.
In Philippians chapter 1 Paul is recognizing that death may be upon him, he knows that he could very well be killed for his faith in Christ, and as he considers this he's almost having a debate with himself. Life or death, which one should I choose? He recognizes that it will be better for others if he sticks around for a while, but he makes it abundantly clear that he would much rather be absent from the body and at home with the Lord. He says in verse 23 - "Having the desire to depart and be with Christ, for that is very much better." As pilgrims, we're not at home in this world. "Our citizenship is in heaven." That's our home country.

Occasionally as believers we experience a feeling that can only be describe as homesickness. We become overwhelmed by a certain nostalgia, and I find this especially prevalent at the end of a summer. After spending time with old friends and meeting new ones, you get to the end of a week and you have to say goodbye. A couple of weeks ago I said goodbye to some good friends, and then I turned around and said to someone, "I can't wait for heaven." Why? Well for one thing, there aren't going to be anymore goodbyes. There is a permanence about heaven that we can't experience here. I heard someone on the radio the other day talking about their mission work in the middle east and some life threatening circumstances that forced them to pick up and move on, and they talked about the sadness of leaving all these believers that they had become attached to, and they said the same thing, that they are looking forward to heaven when we will all reunite in the Lord's presence, in a place that is unlike this world. A permanent country where there are no more goodbyes. And my thinking is that this desire, this homesickness, should not just be an occasional thing in the life of a believer, but to an extent this should actually characterize our lives. "They desired a better country."

Mankind in general has a desire inside of themselves that nothing in this world can fill. I googled the phrase "homesick for a place I've never been" and I found an enormous amount of results, most of which were not actually Christian articles. There were people talking about how they didn't have a bad life, they had a comfortable existence, a nice home, a loving family, but even so they had a longing for something but they didn't know what it was. Somebody said that maybe if they moved to Canada they would find the satisfaction that they were looking for. Someone else commented and said, no, that doesn't work. I live in Canada and I'm experiencing the same feeling. So even unbelievers desire something, though they can't put their finger on it. As believers though, we now understand that the longing we have will only be fulfilled when we are at home with the Lord. We know what we desire. We desire a better country, a heavenly one.

C.S. Lewis actually writes about this longing as an evidence that there is a God. In the book Mere Christianity, Lewis writes - “The Christian says, 'Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water... If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or to be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never to mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that country and to help others to do the same.” He writes in another place - "If you are really a product of a materialistic universe, how is it that you don’t feel at home there? ...Notice how we are perpetually surprised at Time. (“How time flies! Fancy John being grown-up & married! I can hardly believe it!”) In heaven’s name, why? Unless, indeed, there is something in us which is not temporal."

God created us to have a relationship with Himself, and having confessed that we are strangers and pilgrims on the earth, we now recognize that our longing is to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord. This is what Paul writes about in 2 Corinthians chapter 5. In this passage he is comparing our earthly bodies to tents. Back in chapter 4 he referred to our bodies as jars of clay, earthen vessels, and he writes about the hardship and the beatings that he has been enduring in this earthly body for the sake of Christ. But he ends that chapter by saying that this momentary, light affliction is producing in us an eternal weight of glory far beyond all comparison. And our focus has changed. We're no longer looking at the things which are seen, but now we're exercising a new kind of eyesight. "We look not at the things which are seen but at the things which are not seen." And what's the difference? "The things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are unseen are eternal." He then goes on in chapter 5 to talk about some of the differences between the temporal and the eternal. 2 Corinthians 5:1-8 - "For we know that if the earthly tent which is our house is torn down, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For indeed in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven, inasmuch as we, having put it on, will not be found naked. For indeed while we are in this tent, we groan, being burdened, because we do not want to be unclothed but to be clothed, so that what is mortal will be swallowed up by life. Now He who prepared us for this very purpose is God, who gave to us the Spirit as a pledge. Therefore, being always of good courage, and knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord— for we walk by faith, not by sight— we are of good courage, I say, and prefer rather to be absent from the body and to be at home with the Lord." As you read through this you can just feel the longing that Paul has to be with the Lord. His desire is not a secret. We don't sit back and say, "I wonder what he really wanted." No, the desire of a pilgrim is clear. "They desired a better country, that is a heavenly one."
He writes in verse 2 that "in this house we groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven." This groaning is not the groaning that characterizes both believers and non-believers on a Monday morning. This groaning is not caused by aches and pains or weariness. This groaning is actually a spiritual exercise. "We groan, longing to be clothed with our dwelling from heaven." Paul writes about this again in Romans 8:22-23 - "For we know that the whole creation groans and suffers the pains of childbirth together until now. And not only this, but also we ourselves, having the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our body." This is a groaning that we share with the creation itself. The longing of a pilgrim is to be in a restored, perfected state with our Creator.
This life is fleeting, like a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. And the anxious expectation of a pilgrim is that this life will be swallowed up by true life. We prefer to be absent from the body and at home with the Lord. Whatever else you may say about heaven, it's home.

As we think back on the life of Abraham we are given a good contrast between a believer who desired a better country and one who desired the things of this world. I'm speaking, of course, of the contrast between Abraham and his nephew Lot. When the Lord called Abraham we're told that Lot went with him. But before too long they determined that they had to separate due to conflict between their herdsmen. And so Abraham said to Lot in Genesis 13:8-9 - "Please let there be no strife between you and me, nor between my herdsmen and your herdsmen, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Please separate from me; if to the left, then I will go to the right; or if to the right, then I will go to the left." Abraham wasn't anxious to get the better part of the land. He recognized that this world is only a temporary thing, so he gave Lot the choice. Genesis 13:10-13 - "Lot lifted up his eyes and saw all the valley of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere—this was before the Lord destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah—like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt as you go to Zoar. So Lot chose for himself all the valley of the Jordan, and Lot journeyed eastward. Thus they separated from each other. Abram settled in the land of Canaan, while Lot settled in the cities of the valley, and moved his tents as far as Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked exceedingly and sinners against the Lord." Lot naturally chose the better part of the land, even though it bordered the wicked city of Sodom. Maybe it was a good business opportunity, good grazing land, an opportunity for a relatively comfortable existence, but whatever Lot saw as he looked toward those well watered plains it appealed to his senses. And Lot pitched his tents as far as Sodom. But he doesn't stay there. By time we come to chapter 14 we find Lot living, not just toward Sodom or near Sodom, but in Sodom. He began to draw near to the city, then he moved right in. In chapter 19 we see him sitting in the gate of Sodom, a position of some authority, and by this point he has given up the whole idea of living in tents. He now has a house right in the middle of the exceedingly wicked city of Sodom. The city was so corrupt by this point that the Lord determined to destroy it along with the city of Gomorrah. And the Lord sent angels up to Sodom in order that they might warn Lot and his family to flee from Sodom before its destruction. But Lot was so attached to this wicked city that he didn't want to go. He hesitated. He was clinging so tightly to everything that he had been spending his life for that it came to the point where, in the loving compassion of God, the angels had to literally grab Lot's hand and the hands of his family, and drag them out of the city. Lot was living for the present. He was caught up in the now, seeking temporal fulfillment and satisfaction so much so that he hesitated to flee the wrath of God.

Abraham, by the way that he lived, demonstrated that he desired a better country. And Lot also made his desires evident by the way that he lived. We know from the New Testament that both Abraham and Lot were righteous men, they were both believers, and we'll see both of them in heaven. But they both lived drastically different lives. One was caught up in what he could see around him, clinging to this temporal life with all his might, and the other desired a better country, that is a heavenly one. He was willing to renounce everything that this world had to offer in order to press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

Which one are you? Are you more like Abraham or Lot? Granted, as believers we will be in heaven, but how many of us will make it there like Lot? How much of the population of heaven will be made up of Christians who invested everything in this world and laid up no treasure in heaven? The Lord Jesus said "Do not lay up for yourself treasures on the earth... but lay up treasures in heaven." He also said "Where your treasure is there will your heart be also." That's why Lot's wife looked back. Her heart was in Sodom, her desires were in Sodom. Everything she longed for was in the midst of God's consuming fire. And First Corinthians chapter 3 tells us that in a coming day our lives will be tested by fire as well. That's when our desires will be made plain. Do you really desire a better country, a heavenly one, or do you long for the world and it's desires? There is no middle ground. You can't desire the world and it's pleasures and a heavenly country at the same time. The two are opposed to one another. The world and it's desires pass away but the one who does the will of God abides forever. Do you not know that, as James 4 says, friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Consider your own life, really think about your own desires and aspirations. Which world are you living for, the one that is passing away, or the one that will last forever?

We're told in Hebrews 11 that since Abraham desired a heavenly country God is not ashamed to be called his God. Throughout the Bible God identifies Himself as "the God of Abraham." He isn't ashamed to associate Himself with Abraham. Is God ashamed to associate His name with you? We call ourselves "Christians." Is Christ ashamed to have His name associated with us? Or do we demonstrate by our lives that we share His desires?
What do you want? What do you really desire?

Hebrews 11:16 - "But as it is, they desire a better country, that is a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for He has prepared a city for them."

The Confession of a Pilgrim

Hebrews 11:13-14 - "All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own."

Hebrews chapter 11, one of the most well-known chapters in the Bible, gives us the examples of several people whose lives were characterized by faith. The examples given are men and women who by the way they lived demonstrated that they were living for another world. They were seeking a better country. A permanent dwelling place. They were pilgrims.
We have been made for another world. And as believers we are testifying that we believe that, but do our lives really reflect it? Is it apparent to the watching world that our citizenship is in heaven? Not just our final destination, but our citizenship? Or are we allowing the world to squeeze us into its mold? To live in the visible world with an all-consuming focus on the invisible is considered to be odd, foolish and wasteful to the world. To live in this world as a pilgrim is a counter-cultural way to live. The world around us is constantly living for the present. It's all about the now. Living day to day as if tomorrow doesn't matter and will never come. And that kind of thinking is not only characteristic of the world, but it has also crept into the church. Much of Christian teaching today is centered on the here and now - what can Christianity do for my family, my finances, my job, my health, etc. And then heaven is thrown in as a little bonus at the end. But by and large in churchianity today the idea of living for another world, being pilgrims and strangers on the earth, is lost and forgotten. We don't view death as the gateway for everything we've been living for. We need to stop and consider if our focus is really where it should be. Am I spending my short amount of time in this temporal world living for the lasting one?

Over in Hebrews chapter 12 Esau is called an immoral and godless person, why? Because he sold his birthright for a single meal. He traded a future blessing for temporal satisfaction. He was caught up in the present. He had no mind for the future. He was living for the moment, focused on immediate satisfaction, temporal fulfillment, with no thought for the invisible, future realities. In Philippians 3 the apostle, in writing about the enemies of the cross of Christ describes them as those who "set their minds on earthly things." That temporal mindset characterizes the enemies of Christ. We as believers need to be living with an eternal mindset in this temporary world. And how do we do this?

Consider the life of Abraham and the patriarchs in Hebrews chapter 11. In pointing back to these examples the writer of Hebrews says of them that they confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims, or exiles, on the earth. So, in a sense we come up to Abraham and ask him, "Abraham, what do you say about yourself?" And how does he respond? "I am a stranger and a pilgrim on the earth."

What does that confession really mean? What does it mean to be a pilgrim on the earth? Well, typically when we hear the word 'pilgrim' we think of the guys that came over on the Mayflower with funny hats and buckles on their shoes. But when thinking about pilgrims, whatever else comes to mind, we definitely have the idea of a traveler. Someone who's not a permanent resident. Someone who is going from one place to another. Exiles, aliens, sojourners, strangers. The word pilgrim carries with it a sense of impermanence, of mobility, an outsider, someone who doesn't belong, a traveler. And in the biblical sense especially, someone who is seeking a homeland, seeking a country of their own. In fact that's what verse 14 goes on to say - "For those who say such things..." What things? that they are strangers and pilgrims on the earth. "For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own."

So let's go back to the life of Abraham in Genesis chapter 12 and consider the beginning of his pilgrim journey.

Genesis 12:1-4 - "Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, and from your relatives and from your father’s house, to the land which I will show you; and I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” So Abram went forth as the Lord had spoken to him; and Lot went with him. Now Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran."

At the beginning of this chapter the Lord speaks to Abram and He tells him to leave everything that is familiar to him. And I find it interesting that his call to go out from is very specific while his call to go out to is very general. The Lord tells him to leave his country, He calls him to leave his family and He calls him to leave his father's house, very specific. Then He tells him to go out to "a land which I will show you." And Abraham obeyed. He went out not knowing where he was going. He cut the ties to this world. And maybe he didn't go around introducing himself as "Abraham the pilgrim." But his obedience to set out having placed his faith in God, not knowing where he was going, demonstrated that he was a pilgrim. He confessed by the way that he lived that he was not a citizen of this world but of another. He wasn't attached to this world.

Abraham had a change of citizenship. When we first see him he is living in Ur of the Chaldeans, then we see him settling in Haran. But when we come to chapter twelve we find him beginning a life of wandering. And from this time on, right up to his death, Abraham lived his life as a stranger on the earth. His citizenship changed. He went from being a citizen of the world and alienated from God to being a citizen of heaven and alienated from the world.

Think about this verse in Hebrews 11. According to worldly standards Abraham was an absolute failure. And even as Christians this verse might bother us. "All these died in faith having not received the promises." They didn't receive what was promised. They saw it from a distance. They believed God's word, but they died before it was realized. God promised to make him a great nation. This is not something that happens in a short amount of time. God promised to make his name great. He wasn't famous during his lifetime. He lived life as a stranger on the earth and then he died. So the world looking on at Abraham would conclude that his life was a failure. But the world has a skewed standard when it comes to success.
We hear a lot about success.
There are a few different ways we use the word 'Success.' The first and most basic definition of success is simply to accomplish something. You have a goal or a purpose that you set out to achieve and when you complete it you have succeeded in what you set out to do. But more often than not, when we hear the word 'success' it's not being used to refer to the accomplishment of a goal, but rather it's associated with what we might call 'the American dream.' A nice house, fancy car, two car garage, swimming pool in the back yard, picket fence, retirement account, the whole nine yards. Abraham did not live the American dream. He lived life as a wanderer. So according to the worlds standards his life was a failure.

But the picture of success in the Bible is not someone who has everything that this world has to offer, for the Lord Jesus says in Matthew 16:26 - "For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?" That person is ultimately a failure. The world says that he who dies with the most toys wins. God says "What will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and loses his own soul?"

I find it interesting that some of the most successful people in the Bible would be considered failures by the world. True success isn't something that comes from social standing or a bank account. The irony is that someone can have all that this world has to offer and still be a failure. I've always thought it was interesting in Genesis 39 when Joseph was thrown into prison, the Bible says that he was successful. Now, anyone looking at Joseph with our skewed thinking about success would conclude that whatever else Joseph was, he was certainly not successful. But that just goes to show that when our mindset is one way and the Bible says the opposite, our thinking needs to be conformed to the Bible, not the other way around. Why is it such a strange thought that a penniless prisoner would be defined as successful? It's because we have a warped definition of the word success. Success has very little to do with our outward circumstances.

I don't mean to prolong this, but I did a simple internet search of the word 'success' and it produced billions of results. Not wanting to read that many, I simply scanned through the first several pages and the overwhelming sense is that success has to do with some attainment of worldly things (Money, Fame, etc). So I narrowed the search to 'success according to Scripture.' Oddly enough, the results were largely the same. The page filled up with thing like "How to become a financially wealthy according to the Bible."

I didn't get any search results that had to do with someone being wrongfully imprisoned, and yet in that situation Joseph is defined as successful simply because the Lord was with him. I didn't see any results that had to do with someone giving up everything this world has to offer and living life as a pilgrim. And yet that's a successful life according to God.

The world may look at Abraham and say that he was a failure. But God looks at him and says that He is not ashamed to be called his God. God says "That's the kind of person that I'm gonna be associated with." The pilgrim life, contrary to popular opinion, is the truly successful life. And so Abraham's confession was that he was an alien and a stranger on the earth.

And this isn't just for Abraham, this should be our confession as well. In Psalm chapter 119 verse 19 the psalmist says - "I am a stranger in the earth." And this is the confession of every follower of Christ. I don't belong here. This world isn't home to me anymore. This world doesn't have anything that I want. There is a change of citizenship that takes place.
In Ephesians chapter 2 the apostle Paul writes about how we were once dead in our trespasses and sins, how we were enemies of God, excluded from the commonwealth of Israel, without hope and with out God in the world, but now we have been brought near by the blood of Christ. And we read in verse 19 - "So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints, and are of God’s household." So we were at home in the world and alienated from God. But now we are fellow citizens with the saints and are of God's household. There has been a change of citizenship. A reversal. We went from being at home in the world and alienated from God to being alienated from the world and citizens of heaven.
Paul talks about His change in citizenship in Philippians chapter 3. He begins the chapter by talking about his earthly success, the right family, the right tribe, the right training, well respected and looked up to in the eyes of the world. BUT, all those earthly credentials he now considers to be loss in view of the one thing that has real value, knowing Christ Jesus. And now he lives his life striving on for something invisible. He's living for another world. "Forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus." The one pursuit of his life is to press on toward something that we cannot see with the physical eye. And not only does he live in this way, but he invites us to join in following his example. The world is full of people whose end is destruction, whose god is their appetite and whose glory is in their shame, those who are setting their minds on earthly things, and Paul identifies those people as the enemies of the cross of Christ. Now again, Paul says, that used to be me. I was seeking after these earthly credentials, but now I'm living for the unseen world. And he invites us to live in the same way. Why would we do this? Because our citizenship has changed. "For our citizenship is in heaven, from which also we eagerly wait for a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ; who will transform the body of our humble state into conformity with the body of His glory, by the exertion of the power that He has even to subject all things to Himself."
When we become a follower of Christ our identity changes. Our citizenship changes. We recognize that we are only temporarily passing through this world, it's not our home. We're citizens of heaven. We're citizens of a country which we've never seen with our physical eyes. Is that not weird? I'm on a journey to a place I've never seen, but it's my home.

So the confession of a pilgrim: We're aliens and strangers on this earth and we're citizens of heaven. Is that obvious to the world around us? Living in this way is not going to make you popular, even among your Christian friends. Otherworldly Christians, Christians who are living in the power of another world, are not comfortable to be around. We like the things we can see, touch, hear, taste and smell. The life of faith looks past these things, past the physical to the things that are more real, though they are invisible. We may casually say that we are pilgrims in this world, but does your life reflect it? Consider it before the Lord.

Hebrews 11:13-14 - "All these died in faith, without receiving the promises, but having seen them and having welcomed them from a distance, and having confessed that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. For those who say such things make it clear that they are seeking a country of their own."