I gave to one class of religion students a beginning-of-the-year questionnaire that included the question, “Who do you live with?” The authors presumably expected answers such as “I live with my mom, my dad, my sis and the dog,” and I did, indeed receive some answers like that. However, there were a startling number of kids who answered “my friends,” and one who replied “God.”

These are children who are just reaching the age when they can read for themselves. I started to wonder what this question meant to them, what they saw in it.

We Americans tend to be attached to the dream of having a nuclear family and owning a house, so attached that we may forget what “living” really means. “Who do you live with?” has come to mean “In whose home do you sleep and have your meals? At what street address do you receive your mail?” The answer to that question can be painful for anyone who isn’t lucky enough to share quarters with beloved family.

But Jesus says 

 So …maybe I have a particular street address or place where I keep my things and hold the keys and sleep at night … so maybe I ‘live’ there … but my life isn’t limited to that place and the hours I spend there. Here, now, in the daylight and the presence of all of you, I’m not dead, I’m living.

I think these kids have taught me something really valuable. I’m going to start claiming the right to be alive all the hours of the day and all the spaces I inhabit. Who do I live with? Praise God. I live with a whole lot of people.