Home

“Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” — Matthew 8:20

I have been going through Matthew in a Bible study with three young men for about two years, on and off. A couple of weeks ago, we reached Matthew 8:20. At the same time, I have been studying Isaiah, and a passage in Isaiah 2 stood out to me:

“And it shall be at the end of the days, the mountain of Yahweh’s house will be secured as head of the mountains. And it will be lifted up more than the hills, and all the nations will stream to it. And many peoples will come and they will say, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of Yahweh, to the house of the God of Jacob, so that He may teach us something of His ways and that we may walk in His paths. For out of Zion will go forth teaching, and Yahweh’s word out of Jerusalem.” — Isaiah 2:2–3

As I reflected on these passages, I began to ask: What is home? I am not talking about a house, a physical location, a building, or real estate. I am talking about the feeling of home itself. Our emotions can reveal truth to us. God has emotions, and we are made in His image. Many of the things we feel can point us toward greater truths. Home is more of a feeling than a set of practices or standards. It has much more to do with whom you are with than where you are.

God Is Home

I once heard the idea that Jesus is the “feeling of home”: when you dwell with Him, abide in Him, think of Him, and pray to Him, you feel a sense of closeness and belonging; a sense that you are where you are supposed to be. Your temporary circumstances fall to the side. That makes sense because being home is more about whom you are with than where you are. With God, however, it is different because He is home. Heaven is a realm, but there is no part of heaven that escapes the light and glory of God. The realm is not what makes heaven special. It is the God who is there. The apex of the concept of home is God Himself.

Isaiah describes the mountain of Yahweh’s house as established and secured as the head of the mountains, higher than all the hills. All the nations stream toward it. A stream normally flows downhill with gravity, but these nations stream upward, as though drawn by a magnetic attraction. And there are people there. The ideal home is not only God; there are people saying, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of Yahweh, to the house of the God of Jacob.” There is covenant promise and fulfillment in this home. They go so that God may teach them His ways and they may walk in His paths. Zion is portrayed as a beautiful place of perfection; a place to yearn for, wait for, and long for.

Joy in Trials

James writes:

“Consider it pure joy, my brothers, when you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing. If any of you lacks wisdom, ask God, who gives to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him.” — James 1:2–5

This sounds like Isaiah 2. The connection is not that the nations streaming up the mountain are directly related to trials. The connection is pure joy and the wisdom of God. We can hear the phrase “joy in trials” and pass over it quickly. Often, we find ourselves wanting joy in the middle of trials. We say, “This is really hard, but I want joy,” and call that a victory. It may be a partial victory, but James speaks of pure, unadulterated, unblemished joy without complaining, groaning, or wanting something else in the middle of our trials. The joy is Christ. It is union with Him. He is its source, and He gives us peace that surpasses understanding.

The people of God were meant to be magnetized toward Him as the source of joy and as the one who teaches them to walk in His ways. Isaiah says, “Let us go to the mountain of Yahweh, to the house of the God of Jacob, so that He may teach us something of His ways and that we may walk in His paths.” That is asking God for wisdom. It is going up the mountain from your lowly position to learn His ways because you are drawn to Him.

What causes streams to go uphill? It is the changed desire that goes against all earthly sense: the desire the Holy Spirit places in our hearts. That changes everything.

We Are on Our Way Home

When I think about home, I think, “I cannot wait to get there so I can finish my work, take a nap, watch a movie, spend time with my wife, or simply stop being out and about.” But those are merely glimpses of home that I twist to my own advantage. The true purpose of home, which God has implanted in the human heart, goes far beyond temporal comfort. The physical world is a glimpse of a glimpse of our relationship with God and our eternity with Him. Our longing for home is a longing for something deeper and fulfilling. It is something that can satiate a restless heart and soul.

We come home at the end of a tiring day. There is purpose in work, but the end goal is the eternal Sabbath. We work and find fulfillment in our work. We run the race for the glory of Christ, but we run because there is a finish line. We are waiting to hear, “Well done, My good and faithful servant.” There is purpose in tilling the land, raising a family in godliness, and doing the work of your vocation. There is purpose in providing food for your family, buying a gift for your wife, writing a note, helping someone move, or simply being present. You sacrifice your time, money, and effort. These things are not in vain when they serve the goal of love and final satiation.

We do the same in the Christian life. We are going home. Our life is the workday, and we receive glimpses of home along the way. We set aside our duties on Sunday to worship the Lord and receive a glimpse of heaven; of what Zion feels like in Isaiah 2. The church is a community of people together. Acts 2 and Acts 4 show people sacrificing for one another and selling possessions to meet one another’s needs. There is no greater love than to sacrifice your life for a friend, and we can participate constantly in miniature versions of that love.

The joy does not come from the results of those actions. The joy comes from Christ. It is supernatural. We cannot manipulate it out of Him with magic words or special deeds. It is the magnetism of the streams flowing uphill toward the mountain. In a spiritual sense, the Christian works for the weekend. We await the second coming of Christ and the eternal Sabbath rest (Hebrews 4:9–11).

The Tents We Build Along the Way

How do we go home with joy? That is hard because we build miniature tents on the way home. We think, “Maybe I can stay here. The way home is too long. The path is too narrow. Look at this cave. It is nice.” But we forget that the devil is crouching there. Jesus says, “Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” The beautiful mountain of Zion, toward which the Holy Spirit supernaturally draws us, is what carried Jesus through His earthly life, especially the chaos and instability of His years of ministry. Yet there was peace and stability in His heart because of His union with the Father; the union in which we are invited to partake. Any earthly relationship can become an idol or an unhealthy attachment. Yet we can participate in the very union that carried the perfect God-man through His journey home with complete joy. He had no place to lay His head.

I participate in a ministry that holds Bible studies in local prisons. Recently, I spoke with a Christian man going through something very dark. He told me that he could never consider the prison his home. His family outside the prison is whom he longs for. That is home, even though he will remain in prison for a long time and knows many hard things are ahead. He does not get comfortable there. He does not abandon the hope that he will leave and be reunited with his family. When we abide in Christ, we do not feel entirely at home on earth. Even in prison, we feel closer to heaven. That is the Spirit in us. He is the Helper Jesus left for us. This is inseparable from the joy that carries us through hard trials as we go home.

Without that, we would be abandoned to create our own meaning when we lose a job, when a family member dies, or when we cannot overcome an addiction. We would be alone and powerless in the spiritual realm. That is a truly hopeless perspective, yet it is how most people, including some Christians without assurance of salvation, believe their lives operate. So we build houses and tents along the way. Instead of enduring the path up Mount Zion, drawn by union with Christ, we find a hole like a fox or a nest like a bird. Unlike the Son of Man, we find somewhere to lay our heads, not realizing that it is not home.

Almost Home

Years ago, I served in a homeless ministry. We went into camps to preach the gospel, and the experience could feel like the opposite of entering a prison. The prisoner desperately wanted to leave. One homeless man I knew did not. For years, I tried to convince him to face what he needed to face and leave the camp. But he had built both a physical tent and a spiritual one. He had become mired in sin and enslaved to it. He was content to call that place home. It would be easy to look at him with pride, but his state of heart is the state from which I came. It is the state into which I still fall whenever I put my comforts above my longing to finish the race, endure pain with the joy set before me, and go home (Hebrews 12:1–2).

At a former local church in which I was a member, we often sang the song “Almost Home” by Matt Boswell, Matt Papa, and Lauren Papa. I sometimes thought we sang it too much, but other people loved hearing it repeatedly. The people most moved by the song tended to be those who came from broken situations, and those who had it worse than I did. I had built comforts. I was content with certain sins and unhealthy things in my life. I loved money too much and longed to become richer and own nicer things. I wanted a pleasant schedule and a stable morning routine. There is nothing wrong with good routines or discipline, but they cannot be your foundation. That foundation will crumble. The song’s message is simple: do not slow down, and run the race, because you are almost home. In the scale of eternity, we are almost there. The years we live on earth are negligible compared with eternity. I needed to repent of my cynicism.

The Journey and the Destination

The longing for home runs through the stories that have stayed with me. Homer’s The Odyssey—and Christopher Nolan’s 2026 film adaptation—is the epic story of a father trying to return to his family after the Trojan War. Odysseus carries regrets on his journey, and he does not fully face them until he returns home. This also reminds me of The Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan. “Christian” carries a burden until he lays it down at the foot of the cross. Then he can move forward joyfully. He is not searching merely for a comfortable place to exist. He is searching for the satisfaction of his soul. He strays from the path many times, and the Lord uses people and circumstances to bring him back. In The Straight Story, a 1999 film directed by David Lynch, an old man has been estranged from his brother for years. After receiving a terminal diagnosis, he travels across the country on a slow tractor to reconcile before he dies. The tractor breaks down, but he does not give up on his journey. He is not merely fighting laziness or forcing himself to become disciplined. His motivation is reconciliation. He could have made the journey simply because it was the right thing to do. He could have overcome every obstacle, arrived, and still held a hard heart toward his brother. But reconciliation is the reason for the journey.

Odysseus, Christian, and the old farmer all forsake comfort in search of the home that will satiate the soul. That is difficult in a culture surrounded by comforts. We have a remedy for every ailment, caffeine when we do not want to work tired, substances that help us forget our problems, and the option to cut off friends who rebuke us. Comfort is the opposite of repentance and the holy life. The man in prison, the suffering people singing “Almost Home,” and these travelers are not trying to remain where they are. They move forward in hope of final satisfaction at the top of Mount Zion. They cannot find holes like foxes or nests like birds. They must follow Jesus.

I once thought it sounded cheesy to say that Jesus is both the journey and the destination, but it is theologically true. To get to Jesus, we emulate Jesus: we do not lay down our heads and sleep through the race ahead of us. How can we count trials as joy if we avoid them? We leave bad work environments, escape difficult relationships, seek new friends, and avoid trials while searching for our distorted idea of “joy”. Yet trials are opportunities for joy. Purification comes through fire, not through being lukewarm.

There is no comfortable version of Christianity in which God speaks loudly from the mountain so that we never have to climb. True desire for God comes from a changed heart; from the unearthly desires the Holy Spirit gives us toward Jesus so that we do not camp in places that will perish. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. He is the way because He sets the example and is the means by which we can follow it. Through His redemption and propitiation, He unites us to the Father and allows us to partake in the unity between the Son and the Father. He is the truth. It had to be the God-man. It had to be Jesus. He is the life. His actions benefit us, but so does His essence. We do not love God only for what He does for us. We love Him for who He is in His glory and majesty. His essence and actions are one in the same, not two separate aims of love.

How We Go Home

The three questions are these: What is home? What is joy amid trials? How do we go home? We go home by following Christ, clinging to Him, and beholding Him. As R. C. Sproul recalled a statement used by the Ligonier Valley Study Center, “The essence of theology is grace; the essence of Christian ethics is gratitude.” Theology points to God’s grace, love, and action toward us. Ethics, what we do, is our response to the divine imperatives. The Bible gives commands, rules, and ways of life: do this; do not do that; follow this path, not that one; watch your tongue; handle your money well; raise your family well; lead well. All these things are useless if they are not motivated by gratitude toward Christ and the reconciliation we have through His righteousness imputed to us. When we cling to Christ and behold Him, we become more like Him. When we do not, we do not.

The Son of Man had nowhere to lay His head. He never made earth His home. The Father’s plan remained at the forefront of His heart and mind. On the cross, He cried, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” (Matthew 27:46). He submitted in full obedience to the Father’s plan, set before time, to save us from our actions and the wrath of God. It had to be Jesus. The hymn “Jerusalem the Golden,” written by Bernard of Cluny and translated by John Mason Neale, summarizes this longing:

Oh sweet and blessed country, the home of God’s elect;Oh sweet and blessed country that eager hearts expect.Jesus, in mercy bring us to that dear land of rest,Who are with God the Father and Spirit ever blessed.

Foxes have holes, and birds have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head (Matthew 8:20). That sounds like the opposite of home, but home is not finally physical here. True home is the Sabbath rest we will experience when we are fully glorified, united with Christ, made like Him, and with Him forever. It must be eternal. If it is temporary, it is fleeting. There is great joy in waiting for that home. Our present struggles become small when we focus on home, behold Christ, rest in union with Him, remember His love for us, and let gratitude motivate our actions rather than any temporary comfort or tent we can build along the way.

I am sitting in my “lowercase-h” home as I write this. But my “uppercase-H” Home is being prepared for me. A feast is being prepared for me. I cannot grasp the glory of these truths, and even if my mind could grasp them, my words could not describe them. So I let my heart and soul rest in how great and good God is and in His covenant love toward me. I joyfully await whatever trial comes next, searching for joy in it rather than becoming discontent and building a temporary home. Christ is home. He is the way home. He is the reason we go home.

“Foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests, but the Son of Man has nowhere to lay His head.” Let us not lay down our heads either.