Finding the Way Home

A sermon preached with the people of Lordstown Lutheran Church in Lordstown, Ohio.

[Jesus said] “And you know the way to the place where I am going.’ Thomas said to him, ‘Lord, we do not know where you are going. How can we know the way?’ Jesus said to him, ‘I am the way, and the truth, and the life.’”

A couple weeks ago, thanks to social media, I happened upon the results of a study about GPS use – in-car navigation systems, map apps on our phones, anything like that.

The study showed “that people who have used GPS for greater parts of their lifetimes have worse spatial memory during self-guided navigation. In other words, when we use GPS, we lose something of our innate ability to find what we’re looking for.”

Now, I am a person with a terrible sense of direction. It is a joke in my family. If I’m staying in a hotel, I will almost certainly turn the wrong way down the hall exiting my room. Every time. If we’re at the beach, there is little chance I will find my way back to wherever we are sitting after taking a swim, without assistance. And, yes, I often wonder what I would have done had I not become a driver after the introduction of GPS navigation.

But lately, I’ve become aware of my over-use of this technology.

I moved to Cleveland in July of 2021, but I still type in my home address when leaving places I should really be able to navigate from on my own by now. And I know the longer I resist taking off the technological training wheels, the longer it will be before the shape of my neighborhood, the suburb I live in, the larger city, and the region as a whole will take shape in my mind.

The longer it will be before I can find my own way home. It’s actually a pretty acute example of self-inflicted helplessness, isn’t it? And I don’t think I’m alone. But why?

Ultimately, I think it’s about fear. Fear of getting lost, taking wrong turns, wasting time, getting into fender benders. GPS helps me avoid all those messy things. And it assures that I don’t learn.

So this morning we find Jesus speaking to his disciples. He’s in the process of saying goodbye; comforting, instructing, and assuring them. And he tells them, and he tells us, there is a place with God for every single one of you.  And what’s more, Jesus insists, you know how to get there.

Wait, really? says Thomas, panic setting in. I don’t think I do! Can I find it on Google Maps?

But Jesus insists we know how to get home. It’s right there inside of us. The way is God.

We just have have to trust – really trust  -- ourselves, and God.

This trust is the life of faith. And it does involve getting lost, taking wrong turns, wasting time, and even getting into what you might call fender benders. It takes humility, and courage, and, sometimes, a really good sense of humor. And ultimately, it takes confidence.

Because this life of faith requires that we believe. That we really believe that God has a place for us. With God. And that we belong there. With God. Just as we are. Every single one of us.

Writer Rebecca Solnit wrote about what it might have been like for me if I had moved to Cleveland in 1991 instead of 2021. I would have used a map to find my way to all the new places I had to visit. And then I would use that same map to find my way home. But eventually, Solnit writes, “the map becomes obsolete as you become oriented. Or rather the map is then no longer on paper in front of you but inside you; many maps are as you contain knowledge of many kinds of history and community in one place. You no longer need help navigating but can offer it. You become a map, an atlas, a guide, a person who has absorbed maps.”  

I apologize for belaboring a metaphor so intensely, but this seems to me a beautiful description of our life as practicing Christians.

As we commit ourselves to learning the map. As we become more and more oriented. As the “map becomes us,” then we offer this knowledge to the world.

Through our service, our love, our way of being. As individuals and as church – we show our communities and those we encounter along our journey the way home. We show them the way, the truth and the life. We show them God.

And, as a faith community, we become guides to one another. Supporting one another as we find our way, each on our own path. Offering assurance, even in the most difficult times, that we will get there.

I have now been with you all enough times that you feel like friends, and this Holy Space feels comforting and familiar.

So guess what I’m going to do when I leave? I’m going to get in my car, and drive. No GPS navigation. Because I know the way. And if I take a wrong turn? I will not let my heart be troubled. I will learn. I will turn around.  

And I will find my way home.