Cultural Adjustment

I have had the pleasure and adventure of spending a lifetime in different cultures.  Things Asian are different than things European.  Things European are different than things American.  Things American are different than things African.  No two countries are alike, even if they speak the same basic language.  Foods are prepared uniquely to every country.  Modes of transportation can vary greatly.  The way one dresses is most always different from one country to another.  Even the way one perceives something and makes a decision is vastly different from country to country.  It’s absolutely fascinating; sometimes it has made me laugh while at others times it has made me cry, but it’s still fascinating.

I have always found it the wisest decision to consciously adapt to the culture one lives in.  Learn to prepare  and eat the foods.  Learn what is offensive and avoid doing or saying it.  Dress appropriately as the nationals dress.  Make attempts to learn something of the language even if your attempts murder it.  People of any country will appreciate your endeavor to fit in with how they live.  These undertakings make life easier for the visitor to any country.  Feelings of being at home come more quickly until one day it dawns on you that you really do belong.

Although I have lived and adjusted to life in many places, there is one particular culture that I’m still making conscious efforts to adapt to even though I’ve never been there.  I am a citizen of heaven.  I am the child of a Father I’ve never seen.  I have a home being prepared for me that I can’t fully imagine what it will look like.  Heaven.  As the song says, “This world is not my home, I’m just a passing through.”  Although I have never seen my future and eternal home, I know a few things about it.  It will be a place of no more tears, no more sickness, no more fears, no more broken relationships, no more grief, no more pain of any type.  It’s a place where poverty doesn’t exist, pride does not control, greed is no more, and sickness has no hold.  The older I get, there is a stirring inside me; I can hardly wait!  I hope those reading this are citizens, too, just passing through this present world, yearning for the next to come.

“But we are citizens of heaven, where the Lord Jesus Christ lives.  And we are eagerly waiting for Him to return as our Savior.  He will take our weak mortal bodies and change them into glorious bodies like His own, using the same power with which He will bring everything under His control.”  Philippians 3:20-21