The words home-home tell us a little of what Jesus was meaning when He said, “…apart from Me…nothing.” He wants to be our home-home. Not our summer place, not our vacation retreat, not somewhere we go from time to time, but the place we are when we want to be home-home. He is saying that we will never be at home until we are at home in Him. For there is no life apart from the source of life and He is the source. When He says “apart from Me,” He is not just talking about what we do. He is asking us where we live.ⁱ

Wanting to come home is a desire in each and every one of us, but how we get there is another matter. There are so many small voice telling us to follow the yellow brick road. You know how the story ends. You come to a place that appears to look good just to find failed expectations hiding behind a curtain.

Why is following the yellow brick road bad advice?

Because this road does not really take us home! I share some thoughts on this deep desire for love and completion to find our home-home in the excerpt from Heartstone:

This wide-road culture of the world promises to make everything as wonderful and beautiful as it can be, but when we foolishly choose this path, we eventually come to a place in our search for meaning where all we find is a deep emptiness.

The Samaritan woman at the well symbolizes all of us who have used their best efforts to satisfy the yearning for love and completion but find a deep emptiness in the false gratification of counterfeit affections. Until we find rest in the embrace of God’s awesome love and are held by His grace, the sense of emptiness that eats away at us will never be satisfied, and nothing we do no matter how much we try will fill this emptiness on our own. God created us to be in relationship with Him, to honor, worship, and glorify Him; no other act of adoration toward the opposite sex, worldly position, possessions, work, or money can bring a sense of long-term pleasure and purpose to our lives. He is the only thing that is pure and true in this world, and He is the one who can meet all of our needs.

Let me repeat that last sentence — God is the only thing that is pure and true in this world, and He is the one who can meet all of our needs. He is our home-home and there is only one road that we can take to get there. His road, the narrow road.

God offers passage on this road to everyone who accepts it, but it has to be on His terms. Despite the false narrative that ALL roads lead to God, the truth is, we cannot create our own paths or come to a holy God based on our own efforts — we must come the way He has provided. God cannot simply excuse or overlook our sin. He is a loving and very merciful God, but He is also a just God. Justice requires that sin be paid for and at a great cost to Himself — He paid that price!

Don’t be deceived by nice looking roads…the road Jesus talked about is narrow. The world shouted to me that I would be fine on the yellow brick road and over time I became very lost. I learned the hard way that the wide “nice looking” road eventually had a dead end!

The yellow brick road (wide road) looks smoother, easier, faster, and wiser while the narrow road often appears difficult, lonely, and not fun. Seeking only temporary pleasure after temporary pleasure, people miss the abundant life that only Jesus offers — only the narrow road leads to life! Only the narrow road leads to our home-home!

Whats it going to be, Oz or Heaven?