Belonging to God from Ontario to Barbados

Jack and I are planning an early winter vacation. Lord willing, we’ll trade some of the short, dark days of December for tropical breezes and warm sunshine. Mmm… we’ll linger over morning coffee in the dappled shade of a palm tree, wiggle our toes in the powdery sand and float blissfully on the turquoise waters of the Caribbean. We’ll have time for reading books, taking walks and engaging in idle chit-chat with islanders and fellow tourists. The most difficult decision of each day will be choosing a restaurant for supper.

However, our precious ten days are bookended by two days of wearisome travel. Lovely as it is, we won’t forget that Barbados is not our home. We’re visitors. We don’t belong there for more than a short time.

We belong on a 150-acre patch of land in rural Ontario. That’s where the people we love most in the world are all within driving distance, where we’re surrounded by the familiar and comfortable, and where we live the life God has blessed us with. Truth be told, even this place is only temporary. Our passports say Canadian, but our real citizenship belongs elsewhere.

I remember our first holiday together. The day after our wedding we loitered by the breakfast buffet. A wave of security washed over me all at once. This newly-minted husband had promised to stay with me until death separates us! That’s serious commitment. There was (and still is) great joy in knowing Jack will be at my side as long as we both have breath.

It foreshadowed the confidence I felt the first time I read the opening Q&A of the Heidelberg Catechism. What is your only comfort in life and in death? That I am not my own, but belong – body and soul, in life and in death – to my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ.

The idea of belonging to someone else, like “property,” might chafe an individualist’s nerves. And yet there is a strong drive within us to belong, to be part of something bigger than ourselves – family, church, community, sports team, fan club, Costco. The possibilities are endless.

Not much wiggle room in the Heidelberg, though. Christ himself is our only source of strength, hope, consolation. We belong to him body and soul (that’s all we’ve got), in life and death (that’s all there is). God’s claim on us is complete and eternal. Even death won’t shut it down. That inspires one of two reactions. Will you balk or believe?

For believers, that Holy Night some 2000 years ago marks the first advent of our Redeemer – the One who calls us out of darkness and into the blazing light of grace. While that divinely human bundle was placed in a manger, the Judean hills flamed with angelic messengers. To believe their good news is to join the throng of beneficiaries. Membership has its privileges. Look up Psalm 103.

In God’s wisdom there’s a marvelous and mysterious choreography between believing and belonging. This we know for certain – one doesn’t come without the other. This Christmas may you find deep joy in belonging to the Lord Jesus Christ. As we believe in and wait for his return, take comfort that you are not alone. And find your confidence in this extraordinary thought – you are not your own!