This month, a bunch of hot sweaty Americans gathered together in a house in central America to celebrate thanksgiving. I tried to explain to some of my Nicaraguan friends what the holiday was about and what it means to me, how a hard winter and an abundant harvest led puritan settlers of the east coast to give thanks to God for his provision. Even hundreds of years later we follow their example.
Celebrating thanksgiving in another country made me think of the Jewish people living outside of Israel throughout history and remembering their homeland as they celebrated their festivals. They are called the Diaspora, which basically means a people scattered away from their homeland. This term has applied throughout history to groups like the Jews, or African slaves brought to the Americas, or displaced Chinese across Asia.
All of these people held onto the stories and values of where they came from. They longed for their homeland. They sang songs about it and told their children stories that would be passed on for generations. It is a sad yet joyful kind of longing when someone longs for home. In many ways it is better to pine away thinking about a home you do have, then to be absolutely miserable with no place to escape to.
In one of the most passionate psalms, written by a young Jew taken from his homeland, he writes
“By the waters of Babylon,
there we sat down and wept,
when we remembered Zion.
On the willows there we hung up our lyres.
For there our captors required of us songs,
and our tormentors, mirth, saying,
“Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”
How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a foreign land?
If I forget you, O Jerusalem,
let my right hand forget its skill!
It is modernly echoed in a song by Irish folksinger Barry Moore that goes:
Some of them knew fortune,
some of them knew fame,
More of them knew hardship,
And died upon the plain,
They spread throughout the nation,
They rode the railroad cars,
Brought their songs and music,
To ease their lonely hearts.
In the City of Chicago,
As the evening shadows fall,
There are people dreaming,
Of the hills of Donegal.
I don’t long for Israel or Ireland but I too am part of a diaspora. I am part of a rag tag group of ragamuffins wrecked by grace and scattered like firebrands across the globe. But there are no geographical coordinates on this earth that my heart longs for like it longs for All Things Made Right. I celebrate the festivals that remind me of that place, and I have a steady assurance that I will reach it even though I’ve never been there in this life.
No matter where I live I will always carry with me the sick longing to return to the land of my Father. Jesus told me that he is preparing a place for me there, and that he would send the Holy Spirit to comfort my homesickness. He would send him like a letter written from home, and so I have received him. His presence reminds me that it will not always be like this, and that one day I will arrive and all my sehnsucht will become a surprising joy.
Is it a dream?
Nay but the lack of it the dream,
And failing it life’s lore and wealth a dream
And all the world a dream. –Walt Witman
