It’s amazing how one small expression can get your mind musing. At a recent event a speaker mentioned this unique word that’s hard to define or translate: ‘Sehnsucht.’ It’s a deep German word that captures a homesick, nostalgic longing for a place you’ve never actually been. Writers like C.S. Lewis and others have explored this feeling and tried to describe it: a yearning, an ache, a desire for something just out of reach. For believers, it’s the ache for the new heavens and new earth, wherein dwells righteousness. A world not broken by sin. A world made right. A world remade by God. That longing… is Sehnsucht.
I remember the year 2000. I was living in Honduras, far back in the mountains with a missionary family, teaching in a little mission school. It was a beautiful country—lush, green, and full of life—but it wasn’t home. My heart was in Missouri. I was young, but that didn’t stop the ache in my chest that came and went like waves. I was homesick.
Every week, my mother would write me a letter. I lived for those messages. The mail didn’t reach our village, so we had to wait for someone traveling back from the larger town to bring it along. I would sometimes hitch a ride out on Saturday morning just to check the mail. Then, I’d catch another ride back Saturday evening, hoping for even one envelope with familiar handwriting and a Missouri postmark. Her words brought comfort. They reminded me of who I was, where I came from, and what I was headed back to. Home.
There’s a different kind of homesickness I carry now. It’s deeper, quieter, and stronger. It’s Sehnsucht. The longing for a homeland I’ve never been to—but one I was made for.
The Bible speaks of this ache. Hebrews 11 tells us of men and women who lived by faith—”strangers and pilgrims on the earth”—and who “desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for He has prepared a city for them” (Hebrews 11:16 NKJV). It’s the city with foundations, “whose builder and maker is God” (Hebrews 11:10). That passage always stirs something in me. Those saints of old had their eyes fixed on something they couldn’t yet see. They were homesick for heaven.
Peter speaks of it too, in words that carry a holy hope: “Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth in which righteousness dwells” (2 Peter 3:13). What a day that will be—no more sin or Satan, no more injustice, no more wars or rumors of wars. A world where Jesus reigns in total righteousness.
A few years back I wrote these words, and they still ring true today:
“I am excited about the world to come. A new heavens and new earth wherein dwells only righteousness. No more sin and Satan. No more injustice. No more wars and rumors of wars. No more fraudulent behavior. Where I become more of what I always wanted to be. More like Him. He will make it worth being there. He will be the Light. The Attraction. The Reason. The Restorer. The Joy. Can you imagine getting a New World like this along with Him? I am excited about the world to come!”
That’s what keeps us going, isn’t it? That’s what steadies us in the sometimes overwhelming weariness of the now. This world is groaning under the weight of sin, and our spirits groan too. The Apostle Paul described it in Romans 8:23: “Even we ourselves groan within ourselves, eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body.”
It’s homesickness, plain and simple. Sehnsucht. But it’s not a hopeless ache; it’s a homesickness anchored in a promise. Jesus said in John 14:2–3, “In My Father’s house are many mansions… I go to prepare a place for you… that where I am, there you may be also.”
I believe Him. Just like I used to scan the faces of those returning from the city to see if they carried letters, I now watch the sky. One day, we will see Him break through the clouds, and everything we longed for will finally be fulfilled. Revelation 21 says it like this: “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth… and there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away.”
Yes, I am homesick. But this time, it’s not the Missouri home I long for. It’s something higher. Something brighter. Something eternal. And the same God who comforted me in Honduras with letters from home now comforts me with letters from heaven. His Word is full of reminders. Full of hope. Full of promise. I keep opening the pages and reading the mail. And one day soon, He’ll come back and take us there to be with Him forever.
Until then, let’s not get too comfortable here. Let’s keep longing. Let’s keep watching. Let’s keep living like strangers and pilgrims—faithful, hopeful, and homesick—for a country we’ve never seen, but one we already belong to.
Sehnsucht…
– Harold R. Troyer