FYI: TCK (third culture kid) - a term used to refer to children who were raised in a culture outside of their parents' culture for a significant part of their developmental years.
I have family living in Ukraine, Belgium, France, Italy, America and Argentina and most of them speak at least 2 languages (not all of them speak English as one of their 2 languages). We see each other every few years. I have cousins that I have only met twice simply because they live on the other side of the world.
When I tell people this they look at me in awe and say, "Wow, your life is so interesting! You are so lucky to have so much family all over the world!"
Yeah, it is interesting. I have an unusual life and it makes for a great ice-breaker when meeting new people. Also I have a place to stay if I ever go to any of these countries.
However.
Moving around and not getting to see your family for a period of years doesn't always feel so fabulous. Sure, I appreciate my crazy cousins when I see them but we change so fast that by the time we see each other again, we're completely different people. I have never given this much thought growing up as it was the norm for me, but now I am experiencing these things with my immediate family: the time we spend apart from each other changes us and when we get back together again, there's something different about the way we view life and the way we feel and react to different things. It's hard to keep up with and it's sometimes a little painful because you think you know these people like the back of your hand and then you realise you don't - they're changing without you there.
This is just one of the 'TCK things' I have been struggling with recently without even fully realising it straight away. It's been a struggle leaving Ukraine behind to move back to England and although it's been a year now, I know that I am still very much in the process of moving/settling and dealing with the heartache of moving on from the people I left behind while trying not to completely forget them.
I feel like I have two lives: one in Ukraine, one in England. I am two people: Laura in England, Laura in Ukraine. I am both English and Ukrainian and cannot identify myself with one without the other. Who am I?
How does Jesus understand me and all the other thousands of TCKs who are dealing with these things? Cultural identity, the whole issue about "home" and having to get to know your own family over and over again.
Matthew 2 tells us how an angel appeared to Joseph, Jesus' dad, in a dream telling him that he had to flea to Egypt that night because Herod was looking to kill baby Jesus. They didn't return to Israel until after Herod's death. I mean, that could have been yeeeeears. Even when they did return to Israel, Joseph was wary to return to Bethlehem, the city they were living in before they left to Egypt, because the new ruler was Herod's son. Thus they ended up settling down in the city of Nazareth.
Jesus would have been exposed to several different cultures and languages over the course of his life and I don't imagine he spent many of his early years around relatives. He also travelled around the country as an adult, preaching and ministering from town to town, community to community, exposing himself to new ways of life and new mentalities. (Does any of this sound familiar?)
However, Jesus was more than just some TCK. He was more than "just another person" - He was the Son of God. I read this the other day:
"The One Who is the true light, Who gives light to everyone, was coming into the world. He came into the very world He created, but the world didn’t recognize Him. He came to His own people, and even they rejected Him. But to all who believed Him and accepted Him, He gave the right to become children of God."
- John 1:9-12As a TCK I don't often talk about how I am feeling when it comes to my cultural identity or where my heart is finding its home because I know that, on the whole, people won't understand. But Jesus does.
Jesus came to a world He created and was rejected by the very people who were made in His image, who were meant to identify with Him. Talk about not being able to be understood!
Jesus would have combated not only cultural differences in the communities that He came into contact with as a human but also the misunderstanding and rejection from people, even in His own family, because He was bringing a new culture - a heavenly culture - to the world and on the whole people didn't feel comfortable with that. Yet Jesus persevered with them even to cross where He died for their sins.
Jesus willingly left His heavenly abode with God, His Father, to come to Earth and redeem us from the perversion of sin and the destruction it brings to all life. He left perfection for rejection so that we could experience reconciliation with God and be given the identification of 'child of God'.
As a TCK, I am sometimes tempted to resent my circumstances. I allow myself to take on the attitude of a victim of misunderstanding who can't relate to a wide range of 'normal' people and the fruit of that causes me to become discontented, ungrateful, bitter and ultimately miserable. So people don't get me?! People didn't get Jesus (still don't, really) and yet He carried on talking to them and loving them and bring them closer to Himself.
Ultimately my real home is heaven where I'll be one day with Jesus and my family - blood brothers/sisters and brothers/sisters in Christ.
Ultimately the identity I have is that of a child of God. That's what sets me apart from the world but also allows me to live in it with the right attitude.
Ultimately my culture should be that of God - love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control. No earthly culture is completely right or going to make me a better person. But God's culture changes me and allows me to have something to say to all people because the Gospel applies to every community, culture and language.
Jesus understands the heartache we as TCKs experience more than we could ever know and, if we let Him, He will comfort and lift up our hearts and give us our ultimate purpose: worshipping and loving Him.
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