What is Home?

Julianne Cowart
May 9
3 min read

In 11 days I’ll be home with my family again. Even writing that sentence is surreal. I’ve been out of the country for 213 days, and away from home for 245. I write this sitting in a deep green velvet chair in a little library, nestled in the center of Zagreb. This city, and the people we’ve met here, have begun to feel like home. I’ve grown to love the sound of the language, taking the trams, the independence, our church community, and even coffee (although that’s still a work in progress).

Nothing could’ve prepared me for the wide range of emotions I’ve felt over the past few weeks. There’s excitement in returning home, but also grieving. There’s uncertainty, but also security that my God goes with me through it all. I can’t begin to express how gracious, gentle, compassionate, loving, and powerful God has shown himself to be this year. It honestly makes me tear up to think about how sweet my walk with God has been these past 8 months.

Our last week in Croatia will be filled with final coffee appointments, advertising for Fokus, final goodbyes with our friends, packing, and thoroughly cleaning our apartment. We’ll then head to D.C. for a few days of debrief, after which I’ll upload another blog post in reflection. For now, I’d like to share what the Lord’s been teaching me, which I think encapsulates my year as a whole.

What is home? Living overseas for the past 7 months has put me face-to-face with this question multiple times. As I start to love a place- what is home? As I worship with people in their language- what is home? As I laugh with girls I didn’t know a year ago- what is home? As I miss people or places from where I grew up- what is home? As I say hard goodbyes- what is home?

No matter what I do, or how hard I try, I will always be a foreigner in the countries we’ve visited. In Thailand it was especially obvious, but even if I learned Croatian perfectly, my citizenship will never be to Croatia. I’m a foreigner here, and in a different way, I will be one in America too.

During our training in Orlando, someone told us, “You’re not representing America, despite it being where you’re from. You’re representing the kingdom of God.” As Paul describes in Philippians 3:20, “Our citizenship is in heaven.” So yes, while I very much consider my “home” to be Maryland, the home I’ve been born again into isn’t of this world. My inheritance- greater than money or any object someone could bequeath to me- is in heaven (1 Peter 1:3-4).

There’s a song I love by Luke Bower (a Christian folk artist) called “Not My Home” in which he sings:

“I’m a stranger in my own skin

Cause that’s Eden in my bones

If home is where the heart is

Then this world is not my home”

Even as I’m thrilled to be “home” again with my family, I’m even more excited for the day I get to meet my savior face to face.

Just because my gap year is coming to an end, this isn’t the “end” of my mission's journey. This is JUST the beginning of a life I get to spend telling people about the love of God that has transformed my life, as I eagerly await the day I get to be home with Him forever.

Chiang Mai and Zagreb will always have a home in my heart. But as Luke Bower stated, “If home is where the heart is, Then this world is not my home.” More than anything, my heart belongs to the one who calls me “beloved.”