Chapter 1
Good Monday Morning to this Week 1 of 2023
Yes. I’ll stay with you, I’ll protect you wherever you go, and I’ll bring you back to this very ground. I’ll stick with you until I’ve done everything I promised you. Gen. 28.15
By faith Abraham obeyed and sojourned when he was called to go out to a place
that he was to receive as an inheritance; he went out, not knowing where he was to go.
By faith he sojourned in the promised land as in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs of the same promise.
Sojourn: a temporary stay.
Temporary stays can be very rewarding, thinking about a vacation or a trip or journey or season in your life. You get to sojourn for a little while.
Sometimes I think life for us is a series of sojourns. Yes, many of us have a place we call home, it never really is permanent and yet so often in our lives we are called to move on. to make a new start, so sojourn elsewhere. On the other hand, in the midst of our life we get to sojourn, take a pause, rest and dwell with a certain topic, music, theme or atmosphere for “a while”.
So, where does sojourn come in? Perhaps the misunderstanding about its meaning stems from the connective grammatical function of the word so: “I want to travel, ‘so’ I ‘journ.’” However, it derives from subdiurnare, meaning “part of a day” and referring to a resting period during a daylong journey.
In a story of an American activist she also chose the name and title; “Sojourner Truth”. She wished not to travel toward truth, but to abide in it. (To stay for a while in it).
I wish you a great start as you journey and as you sojourn this year. Wising that you, that you stay for a while, in places of deep meaning, inspiration, places of calm, places of joy, places of fulfilment, places of duty, places or care.
Happy New Year 2023
Philemon