Why would an old man dig wells? Why would he plant a tree that he would never live to see the good of? A tamarisk tree is one of the best for providing a cooling shade, but Abraham would never sit under it. Yet Abraham understood something of the pilgrim life. He understood that things only have value in light of the God who is everlasting.

Recently Dee and I have been watching some David Attenborough documentaries. The last set that we watched were focussed on migration. Sharks that travel to a remote Hawaiian Islands to attack fledgling albatross chicks attempting their first flight, salmon turning bright red, and braving Alaskan bears, to reach their spawning grounds, lay their eggs and die, elephants marching across China in search of water. Migration is a big part of the animal kingdom. But one of the biggest migrations of all wasn’t even mentioned; that of humans.

I recently read that it is estimated that the global diaspora currently sits at about 350 million people. Were the diaspora a country, they would be the third largest in the world.1 Even outside of mass migration of refugees, those who move countries for work, or overseas missionaries etc., most people spend at least some period(s) of their life migrating, even within their own country. Whether moving to a new city for university, getting married and moving to a new part of the country, or looking for work in a new town, at some point we are likely to feel the rootlessness of our lives.

With this feeling can come one of two pitfalls. On the one hand, we may be tempted to fight hard against the push of rootlessness, only being willing to invest in relationships that we are “certain” are going to last, seeking to build, long-lasting stable support-structures, trying our hardest to have a settled life, where everything is predictable, and we can relax, knowing that we are “home”. We may forget that this is not our ultimate destination in its current form.

On the other hand, those of us who embrace a more migratory pattern of life can become so future minded that we barely allow our feet to touch the ground and leave an imprint. We don’t invest deeply in things where we are, because our eyes are so fixated on the horizon. We think we are making progress with speed, but when we look behind, there is nothing of lasting value left over.

But the Biblical answer is not to suppress our migratory nature, nor to embrace it to the exclusion of investing in this world. The vast majority of the Scriptures were written to, by, or about, migrating people. Whether exiles from the garden, slaves in Egypt, pilgrims heading to feasts, exiles in Babylon, or the persecuted church and city-hopping Apostles; God’s people have always been on the move. One could maybe even go so far as to say that it is the normal human condition.

And perhaps even more stunning, is the fact that our God is a migratory God. He is the one who promised to be with the Patriarchs as they roamed the land he had promised. He is the One who asked for a tent that he might dwell with his people on the move. He is the One who would not be bound by four walls of a temple but was far more pleased to dwell with his people where they worshipped him. He is the One who became incarnate and roamed the towns of Israel with nowhere to lay his head. He is the God who dwells in the midst of his people, the church, regardless of where they are, or where they go. He stays still no more than we do.

Recently I was reading Genesis 26, and the Biblical challenge of investment-focussed migration stood out to me. Here is one of the few stories focussing on Isaac. It begins with God affirming to Isaac his promise to give the land to him and his descendants. Then, despite the famine, Isaac is warned not to go to Egypt (as his father once did). Rather he should sojourn in the land.

He obeys, but instead follows in the footsteps of another of his father’s follies, pretending Rebekah is his sister. The matter is resolved, and we see that despite famine conditions, despite these other people living in the land, Isaac is blessed by the Lord and reaps a hundredfold. (v.12)

So, Abimelech tells Isaac to get lost. He urges him along out of the vicinity. And this is where the irony begins. Abimelech twice in this story tells Isaac to move along, and yet these two incidents are bookended by God’s promise to Isaac that it isn’t Abimelech’s land at all… it is his. (v.3 & v. 23).

So what is Isaac’s reaction? Does he just flee somewhere else to sit and settle, and find an unused space in a foreign land where he and his family can put down roots without fear of interruption from the enemy? Does he fatalistically resign himself to a migratory existence, and refuse to do anything meaningful with his life?

No. He digs wells. He starts by reopening his father’s wells. Then he starts digging some of his own. This chapter is full of Isaac following his father’s footsteps, and it’s no surprise. After all, it was by living in his father’s tents that he became an inheritor of the promise.

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