The Plac
No, I did not misspell the word place. The Plac (тхе плаце) is a Serbian word that when directly translated means “the place”, though it means far more than merely “this place” or “that place”. Plac, or the Plac as it was often called by myself and the other members of our large extended family, simply meant “the place” to us.
For my family and I, the word Plac directed our minds not to a single geographical location, but rather to a certain place held within our hearts. Whenever one of my aunts or cousins - and even myself - said that they were coming by our home or to my uncle's home right next door, they would simply say that they'd be swinging by the Plac sooner or later (although, it was more often sooner, and they often stayed far later, which made for many joyous memories I shall not soon let go of).
The Plac was our family home. The phrase “the plac” could be understood as either being the house in which my family had always lived or the home of our uncle and his children right down the hill, but it often referred to both. My late father and his brother purchased the slice of land many moons ago and drew a line in the sand (or forest) between the top half of the lot wherein our home was located, and the lower section of wood where my uncle then proceeded to build his family's future home.
Although we were two very distinct families, there was a great sense in which our homes and lands and very lives were tied up with one another's. Family dinners, reunions, holidays, bonfires, church events, sleepovers, games of baseball, long nights of manhunt, countless summer days of biking in the forest, Sunday evening sings, and Friday night board games were all held beneath the umbrella of a single location - the Plac. Or, quite simply, home. Not my home or my uncle's home, but our home. Indeed, it was the dearest place in all the world to me.
Shortly after my father passed away and settled in at another plac altogether, my mother, sisters, and I left our childhood home. The Plac, with its rolling hills and dense forests, were behind us, and another journey began before our very feet. A new journey in another home; not terribly far away from our old home, but in another sense, all too terribly far from the Plac.
It was in this grand transition from home to house, from the Plac to “the place”, that I caught a glance or two at our homeland in Heaven, albeit merely from the shores of this fleeting earth. It was in saying goodbye to our childhood home, and the memories made within those walls and halls, that the Lord began to untether my heart from this world in a way that I had not yet known to be possible. This was not an easy journey, nor was it a quick and painless one that was free from bereavement and bewilderment. However, I found the move itself somewhat easier due to the reality that I had wrestled with the beast known as “moving” in the weeks, months, and years leading up to the exodus itself; a journey that began just as my earthly father's journey here below had ended.
It seemed like a good deal of living had in fact only begun for myself shortly after my father rounded the bend in this road we call life. One man's adventure had come to an end here below, and countless other journeys had really only begun to take form. It is a comfort, however, to remember that though my father's pilgrimage here is over, he is no doubt more alive now than he has ever been. He has not passed from life into death, but indeed from death into life - indeed, into life Himself. He has taken up a dance with Divinity that shall never cease. But I am not my father, nor am I now in his shoes. He had gone home, and I had, for the first time in my short life at that point, left home.
Though, in the midst of sorrow, is it not so often God’s delight to show unimaginable and unexpected grace? It was during this time of great transition from one season to another that the Lord saw fit to introduce yet one more ‘new’ part into my life. It was during this already tumultuous season that grace upon grace was heaped upon me - for, it was in this time that a friendship began to blossom between myself and the beautiful woman who is now my wife. Indeed, just as God brings some people out of your life, I’ve found that He is always faithful to bring others in at just the right time.
While I love my wife to no end and could write about her endlessly, I did bring her into this particular story for good reason. After my wife had left what was then her childhood home in another province and began to settle down where we now find ourselves, she found that the Lord was at work mightily in her heart during this time of transition. Indeed, during my own move she confessed to me that a house does not become a home simply overnight - these things take time. In fact, she had said that there is a part of her heart that has not yet truly settled down; there remains a fragment of her soul that still roams the halls of the home she left those few years and many miles ago. There is a sense in which her home now is but a shadow of the home she had left behind - a mockery of sorts, a rough sketch of the real thing that her memory so cherishes. This is not to say that our home now is any less home than where she came from. Indeed, there is far more to be found where she is now than in that home she had left behind - but home is home, and it is not quite so easily replaced or forgotten.
Once we moved from the Plac many things changed, but thanks to God a good deal of things remained in a state of familiarity. The rolling hills and thickets gave way to paved streets and cramped quarters, but the faces around me were the same, and within a few short days most of our furniture was arranged in such a way that this new house began to feel like a home away from home. Only, therein lies the rub: it was a home away from home.
As comfort and warmth began to stir in that new house, just as embers do from a fire coming back to life, so too did these little comforts and familiarities draw my mind to the fact that this is not home - not quite, not close. It is a mockery of home. But, what I have discovered is that it is not a mockery of home that points backwards towards our old home, the Plac, but rather a mockery that points forwards. Nor is it a negative mockery. It is a rough sketch, of sorts, that strives with all its might to point towards the reality of its own self. To not only an image or a sketch, but the real thing - the very thing beyond the thing.
And what is this 'thing beyond the thing'? It is that place to which our soul's deepest desires incline; that itch of inconsolable longing that ripples across our heart at sunset or burns in our chests during fellowship with dear friends. However, these are not home, they are but markers that guide us on our way along this earthly pilgrimage. Or, as C.S. Lewis has said, “Our Father refreshes us on the journey with some pleasant inns, but will not encourage us to mistake them for home.”
This world is not our home. It is an inn along the way that, while it may be filled with many comforts, should not be mistaken for the real thing. Though, how is it that a place we have never been to can suddenly feel like home at the mere mention of it? There cannot possibly be a place more different from earth than Heaven, or so it would seem at times. How then are we to look forward with any kind of excitement to a place that we've not only never been, nor can possibly imagine, but is indeed so foreign to our natural selves?
In all my probing and in the wondering and wandering of my mind I have but a single answer - Jesus. Jesus will be there; that is not only enough, but it is all we shall ever need. We will not recognize the countryside once we arrive, nor will we know how to get around or where to go at first. No doubt the furniture will be arranged in a way that we've never seen before, and there will likely be a great deal of folks and beasts that we have never met nor yet imagined, but He will be there. We will for the first time in our lives not be strangers or guests or tenants, but we will be at home, never to roam again. I trust that Heaven will be quite far removed from any of our thoughts and wildest expectations, and yet all the while it shall feel as though it is the place we've been longing and looking for all our lives. Our souls shall find rest and lasting pasture within the heart of our God and Lord. We will have finally arrived at the Plac that He has prepared for us.
