Following my multicultural posts here (part two link at the bottom of part one), I just couldn't NOT post more about my home country. Most of these pictures came from our mission trip to Japan back in 2010. (Most pictures can be clicked and enlarged.) If you think about it, a lot of these differences have to do with the culture. In America, some people are concerned about their carpets getting dirty, but in Japan, outdoor shoes will ruin the floor. So you take your shoes off at the door and wear slippers in the house. And don't worry, most people have a bunch of slippers for guests to wear. Inside the house. Transportation.
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People have a lot of questions. We’re a curious bunch by nature, aren’t we? Sometimes that’s a good thing, or else we never would have found out about gravity. Sometimes it’s not such a good thing, because some things are better left to the imagination, am I right?
Most people, in addition to being innately curious, also have a strong sense of right and wrong (also known as: our conscience, also known as: the Holy Spirit). Put those two things together with the fact that God’s ways are higher than our ways, and His thoughts are higher than our thoughts, added to the exhortation that we should just trust God to do what’s best, you’ve got a dilemma. Sometimes God’s best doesn’t make sense to us, and we want to know why. Isn’t that the oldest rail against God? All from the serious-in-the-grand-scheme-of-things “Why did my friend have to die without getting saved first?” to the makes-no-difference-to-life-but-is-important-to-me “Why doesn’t he like me back?” We want to know! But we’re not supposed to question God, right, because that shows our lack of faith. Here is part two of my multicultural awareness post. Read part one here first to get the gist of where I’m coming from with this.
I wrote this a long time ago; it's been sitting in my drafts folder for forever. I just didn't know where I was going with it. I finally figured it out last night, so here is part one!
__________________________________________________________ Today on the way home from an errand, I passed a family playing football in their yard. They were all different colors, but it looked like one family. My first thought was, "Oh look, it's a multicultural family." Upon further reflection, however, I wondered if maybe they were just a multicolored family. No matter what skin color one has, what determines one's culture is the one one is raised in. (Wow, that was a weird sentence, doesn't one think?) I thought about myself and realized that I am a multicultural person (the technical term is "third culture kid"; there is a lot out there about it--google it if you want). I was raised in one culture, and now I am raising my child in a different culture. I wonder if being multicultural is harder or easier. I guess I will never know, because I can't ever be one culture. My formative years were spent in the country of Japan. I loved living there. When it comes down to it, I consider Japan to be "home". My family and I were there as missionaries, but the Japanese culture wasn't the only one that influenced my siblings and me. We were missionaries to the American military, so we also had a lot of Army-, Air Force-, and Navy-ness sprinkled in there (and Marine-ness, since my dad is a former Marine). Since one way to become a citizen of America is to serve in her military, there were also many Filipino families in our church. We also had a Scottish lady (and her half-Scottish kids) and a family from Peru. Just to name a few. |
Who am I, you ask?
In 2006 I had a stroke, and every day my husband encourages me to use my remaining brain cells to the best of my ability. I love to organize, make crafts, and go on adventures (safe ones). I hope that through my blog posts, you will be encouraged to accept and make the best of challenges God throws at your life. Categories
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