The last few days have been very intense. As I am preparing to finish my Ph.D. program in Tennessee and move to Iowa, I went on a weekend-long vacation on the Smoky Mountains with some friends from the communities in the South East and Ohio (5 families from 5 different States!) and said bye to a friend that moved back to Europe for a new job.

The weekend with the friends in the community has been a sign of what my heart desires and what it is made for. In the simplicity of being together, hiking, cooking and singing, I rediscovered that this is the place where Christ makes himself present in my life. These friendships are the home where Christ “justifies” himself in my life. And, therefore, it is a place I want to obey to, because the more I do the more I become myself.

However, all these friends live 3 to 6 hours away and weekends like this one are always too short! On Monday, I was back in my office with my dissertation that needs to be done, and on Tuesday I drove to Atlanta to say goodbye to a friend that moved back to Europe.

At times in my life I felt the risk that my certainty relied more on the friends in the community than on Him that gives them to me. However, after this weekend and after taking Pietro to the airport, I realized that my certainty is more and more on Him. Because, in the sadness of not being closer to these friends, I find a gladness that is not mine, and that I could not give me by myself.

And so the circumstances may be more or less facilitating (comparatively speaking, Switzerland is pretty far!) but they are the starting point rather than the limitation. They are the starting point to which I need to say "yes" to in order to obey and follow Him in my life. It is ultimately the promise of happiness that I experience in these friendships that makes it possible to even think to move to Iowa and be able to find the same happiness. And so it is not “notwithstanding” the nostalgia for these friends, but rather “by virtue” of it that I can be sure that He who justifies himself in this companionship is going to provide the same happiness today and in the future.