Home Sweet Home

Jul 23, 2017 • Alasdair Groves • Psalms, Summer in the Psalms, Sermon, 2017

REFLECTION QUOTES

Oh home, let me come home. Home is wherever I’m with you.”

~Edward Sharpe and the Magnetic Zeros (Indie Rock/Folk group)

“There’s no place like home.”

~Judy Garland as Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz

“Oh say does that star spangled banner yet wave o’er the land of the free and the home of the brave?”

~Francis Scott Key, written while a prisoner on a British ship in the War of 1812, watching the bombardment of an American fort

“[Dartmouth] is a small college, but there are those who love it.”

~Daniel Webster, famed 19th century orator and attorney.

“Homeward bound, I wish I was. Homeward bound. Home! Where my thought’s escaping, home! Where my music’s playing, home! Where my love life’s waiting silently for me.”

~Simon and Garfunkel

“Home is behind, the world ahead,
And there are many paths to tread
Through shadows to the edge of night,
Until the stars are all alight.
Then world behind and home ahead,
We’ll wander back and home to bed.
Mist and twilight, cloud and shade,
Away shall fade! Away shall fade!”

~J.R.R. Tolkien, from the Lord of the Rings

SERMON PASSAGE

Psalm 84 (ESV)

1 How lovely is your dwelling place, Lord Almighty!
2 My soul yearns, even faints,
for the courts of the Lord;
my heart and my flesh cry out
for the living God.
3 Even the sparrow has found a home,
and the swallow a nest for herself,
where she may have her young—
a place near your altar,
Lord Almighty, my King and my God.
4 Blessed are those who dwell in your house;
they are ever praising you.
5 Blessed are those whose strength is in you,
whose hearts are set on pilgrimage.
6 As they pass through the Valley of Baka,
they make it a place of springs;
the autumn rains also cover it with pools.
7 They go from strength to strength,
till each appears before God in Zion.
8 Hear my prayer, Lord God Almighty;
listen to me, God of Jacob.
9 Look on our shield, O God;
look with favor on your anointed one.
10 Better is one day in your courts
than a thousand elsewhere;
I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house
of my God
than dwell in the tents of the wicked.
11 For the Lord God is a sun and shield;
the Lord bestows favor and honor;
no good thing does he withhold
from those whose walk is blameless.
12 Lord Almighty,
blessed is the one who trusts in you.