Theme · narrative
Exile and Wandering
Cain becomes a wanderer east of Eden, and the pattern repeats across Scripture. Abraham is called to leave home and live as a stranger in the land of promise. Israel wanders forty years in the wilderness, caught between slavery and promise. The psalmist sings the LORD's song in a foreign land during the Babylonian exile. Hebrews describes the patriarchs as pilgrims who confessed they were strangers on earth, seeking a homeland — a better country, a heavenly one. Peter addresses believers as 'elect exiles,' framing the entire Christian life as a journey toward a home not yet fully realized.
Related doctrines
Passages expressing this theme
- 1Pet 1:1 — Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia,
- 1Pet 2:11 — Dearly beloved, I beseech you as strangers and pilgrims, abstain from fleshly lusts, which war against the soul;
- 2Tim 4:10 — For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world, and is departed unto Thessalonica; Crescens to Galatia, Titus unto Dalmatia.
- Acts 8:1 — And Saul was consenting unto his death. And at that time there was a great persecution against the church which was at Jerusalem; and they were all scattered abroad throughout the regions of Judaea an
- Deut 26:5 — And thou shalt speak and say before the LORD thy God, A Syrian ready to perish was my father, and he went down into Egypt, and sojourned there with a few, and became there a nation, great, mighty, and
- Eph 2:12 — That at that time ye were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and without God in the world:
- Exod 2:22 — And she bare him a son, and he called his name Gershom: for he said, I have been a stranger in a strange land.
- Exod 2:23 — And it came to pass in process of time, that the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel sighed by reason of the bondage, and they cried, and their cry came up unto God by reason of the bondage
- Gen 3:23 — Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
- Gen 4:12 — When thou tillest the ground, it shall not henceforth yield unto thee her strength; a fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be in the earth.
- Gen 4:14 — Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth; and from thy face shall I be hid; and I shall be a fugitive and a vagabond in the earth; and it shall come to pass, that every one
- Gen 6:2 — That the sons of God saw the daughters of men that they were fair; and they took them wives of all which they chose.
- Gen 11:31 — And Terah took Abram his son, and Lot the son of Haran his son’s son, and Sarai his daughter in law, his son Abram’s wife; and they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of
- Gen 12:1 — Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee:
- Gen 20:13 — And it came to pass, when God caused me to wander from my father’s house, that I said unto her, This is thy kindness which thou shalt shew unto me; at every place whither we shall come, say of me, He
- Gen 37:28 — Then there passed by Midianites merchantmen; and they drew and lifted up Joseph out of the pit, and sold Joseph to the Ishmeelites for twenty pieces of silver: and they brought Joseph into Egypt.
- Gen 47:9 — And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years: few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, and have not attained unto the days of the
- Heb 11:8 — By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
- Heb 11:13 — These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the eart
- Heb 13:14 — For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come.
- Jas 1:1 — James, a servant of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ, to the twelve tribes which are scattered abroad, greeting.
- Jer 2:2 — Go and cry in the ears of Jerusalem, saying, Thus saith the LORD; I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that
- Jer 29:4 — Thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel, unto all that are carried away captives, whom I have caused to be carried away from Jerusalem unto Babylon;
- John 15:19 — If ye were of the world, the world would love his own: but because ye are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you.
- Num 14:33 — And your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your whoredoms, until your carcases be wasted in the wilderness.
The Church Fathers on Exile and Wandering
After he went abroad, he who departed from the church squandered his inheritance. "After," it says, "leaving his home and country, he went abroad into a distant country." What is farther away than to depart from oneself, and not from a place?… Surely whoever separates himself from Christ is an exile from his…
We who in this world "are exiled from the Lord" walk about on earth, it is true, but we are hastening on our way to heaven. For here we do not have a lasting place, but we are wayfarers and pilgrims, like all our fathers.
"And I remained in solitude." Sometimes someone remains in solitude of place, because he remains there bodily; sometimes in mind, because even among crowds he thinks of the things of God. Hos. 2: "I will lead her into the wilderness." Lam. 3: "He will sit alone." And these things, according to the Gloss, are…
"Alas, that my sojourning has become far off!" [Psalm 120:5]. It has departed far from You: my pilgrimage has become a far one. I have not yet reached that country, where I shall live with no wicked person; I have not yet reached that company of Angels, where I shall not fear offenses. But why am I not as yet there?…
"He departed, and went into a desert place." This was, indeed, the Creator's customary region. It was proper that the Word should there appear in body, where before he had appeared in a cloud. To the gospel also was suitable that condition of place which had once been prophesied for the law. "Let the wilderness and…
How can he be said to go out and to come in, whom no space can enclose? What country can be his, who made, and who possesses, the whole universe? In truth, Christ goes out and comes in not of himself, nor for himself, but in you, and on behalf of you, until he recovers you from your exile, and calls you home from…