It broke his heart to tell me "no" but he knew that even going home wasn't going to help this time.

It broke my heart as well. I was sure that if I could just return to our little bedroom in our little alley house, this fearful and fearsome pain would stop.

There really is no place like home. And when we've been on the road, that last 10 miles seems to take an eternity. Almost home. Almost home. But not quite there yet.

Danny is also a homebody. He loves to travel to see the folks, he loves to go camping, and I don't have any trouble getting him out of the house and out and about. But home is where he wants to be, soon after leaving. I can't count the number of camping trips and vacations that we've cut short by a day or two, even three, because home was calling.

A friend from way back got in touch recently to ask for prayers for her little step-grandson, critically ill at Children's Hospital in Denver. He spent weeks there and though of very tender years (still shy of his second birthday) the long days of illness and strangers nearly broke his spirit. A renewed call for prayer came forth when the nurses reported that this child, barely out of infancy, was suffering from depression. He was, I'm sure, yearning for home, though at his stage of development he couldn't identify his malaise nor give words to it.

He's home now and, I trust, improving daily.

There really is no place like home.

When work, or family emergencies or even the service to your country call you away from home for an extended amount of time, the last thought before sleep and when waking, is "home." The memories of home and the faces there call out and your heart is filled with longing.

Your own bed. Your own shower. Your own soft towels and shampoo, with no one standing outside the bathroom door wondering how much longer you're going to be in there. At home, everyone knows how long Mom takes in the shower, or Dad. You're home.

At home, every face is familiar. At home, every personality is known. At home, there is a place for everything and everything is in its place (though visitors may think one place or another rather strange for that particular something).

Nowadays we don't do a lot of traveling. The last time I packed a suitcase was for an overnight trip to Omaha to attend a work-related seminar more than a year ago. The first thing I did upon arriving at the hotel was to call home.

So how do I explain my current homesick condition?

The older we get, it seems, the more this homesickness increases. Every night on the evening news, hearing reports of violence, war, and deprivation, the longing increases. All day long, reading the wire stories for publication, the radio playing in the background, I'm homesick. And these "last 10 miles" are taking an eternity.

I long to see the face of my Father, whom I have yet to see face-to-face. I can't explain how it will be so, but I'm sure I'll recognize every face there. And I know that the one face I have longed to see with every breath will be front and center and I can't imagine tearing my eyes away from his, no matter how splendid the glory around me.

Home. A place prepared for me? It sounds too good to be true, but God has promised it and God never lies.

"Jesus replied, "If anyone loves me, he will obey my teaching. My Father will love him, and we will come to him and make our home with him." John 14:23 (NIV)

Things you won't see in heaven:

Homeless shelters