A home is a special place. Many quotations testify to this and we have probably heard them: Our home is our sanctuary. A person’s house is his or her castle. Home is where the heart is. There's no place like home. Home, sweet home.

A peaceful home is like a refuge from a stormy, often upside-down world. It’s the place we are most familiar with, especially if it’s the place we grew up in. Imagine the tinge of sadness we would feel if we were to return to our hometown to find nobody left, even the buildings gone. The favourite char koay teow shop around the corner run by the Ah Pek is no more. Never mind the buildings, even the whole community has disappeared. We would definitely feel a sense of loss.

When folks grow older, especially if they are losing their memory or sight, they may lack confidence in venturing outside. Their home is the anchor that grounds them to all that is familiar in their world.

Ever since the dawn of history, humanity has been on the move. For a variety of reasons, they have been forced to leave their homes for unfamiliar surroundings and foreign lands, sometimes voluntarily, for economic reasons; other times forced by persecution or oppression.

It may be easier to go west (or east or north or south as the case may be), young man, when one is in the prime of life. It is less easy for older folks to start a new life in unfamiliar surroundings, especially when they lack financial security of their own and have to be beholden to others.

Leaving familiar surroundings is never easy. There are some who choose to return to the place of their birth or the area they grew up, just before they die. There is often a yearning for the place of our birth or childhood.

The first human beings were forced to leave their sanctuary when they turned against God and the natural order as it was meant to be. But God did not abandon them. He followed them into exile.

Ever since then, humanity has been in exile in one way or another. And God has continually sent prophets to remind them that God was still concerned about them and deeply immersed in their lives.

The Israelites thought they had everything and took their relationship with God for granted. After all, God was with them in the holiest of holies, in the Temple — or so they reasoned. But they too were forced to flee into exile in Babylon after turning against God.

Once again, God did not abandon them. He followed them into exile. Never mind that God’s “official dwelling place”, the Temple, was destroyed. The people were more important than buildings, their commitment to justice and mercy and compassion more valuable in God’s eyes than their sacrifice and burnt offerings.

God had pitched his tent in this world. John the Baptist lived in the wilderness without a roof on his head, preaching to all who cared to listen.

Jesus too started life in exile, as Joseph and Mary were forced to leave all that was familiar and flee to Egypt.

During his ministry, Jesus seldom had the comforts and security of a home. Instead, he observed, ‘Foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head.’ (Luke 9:58) Yes, God himself was truly in exile among his people.

When the Holy Spirit descended, God found a dwelling place among all those who would work to build his kingdom of justice and peace in our world.

Many of our ancestors too were migrants as well, leaving behind their own familiar surroundings, to become nationals of another country. There are others who are not as fortunate. They have lost the refuge of their homes and become refugees, migrant workers, asylum seekers, stateless people, street people, people without a home of their  own, evicted tenants and displaced urban pioneers.

There are those who are blessed with land titles and title deeds to their homes, while others who have lived on the land for decades, even centuries have no such documentary titles to their homes or land.

These communities could range from Orang Asli and the natives of Sarawak and Sabah struggling for native customary rights to their land, urban pioneers being displaced for property redevelopment, plantation workers being evicted from their homes for housing projects, farmers being turned into contract workers by giant agricultural plantations... God continues to pitch his tent among us, and I would imagine he would be specially present in the midst of all those who are suffering or facing “exile” for one reason or another.