Stay and Go

I have always wanted to see and experience the world's cultures.
I want to smell them, observe customs, interact in the marketplace, visit homes, taste their delicacies, and feel the textures of their lives.

While at teacher training in New York, I learned about Third Culture Kids (TCKs). They have a hard time identifying to one culture. They may have a passport from Germany, speak Portugese, and live in Thailand. (They don't belong in any ONE place.)
They are unified with the TCK culture because of their shared cross-cultural experiences.
These are the kids with a true "global perspective."
These are the kids I will be teaching.

I am thankful for them and I am excited to see how their different perspectives can be used in the artist's great canvas -- especially as our world morphs into a larger "global economy."

Humorously, I once had a conversation with someone about their children traveling overseas, if the parents would encourage it, etc.
The reply came that we (21st century America) have such an ability to see and experience things through DVDs and the internet, why travel? Why not just stay and serve where you're at? Why do we need to go anywhere else?

(Even as I reflect on those words...I am saddened.)

After that conversation I began to question my motives for wanting to go TOUCH the children in Uganda, to SEE the filth in India, and SMELL the heavy air in China. I wondered if it was evil or wrong -- something I needed to chuck aside, but couldn't.

I later found that it WAS an idol I needed to give up as a consuming desire, but I now realize that neither perspective is inherently wrong. They're two perspectives that CAN be and SHOULD be lived out -- if done with caution and wisdom.

It's foolish to say we should never go.
We MUST have the TCKs who KNOW the culture.
(How can you know another culture or even another person without personal interaction? Even dating couples are surprised to find how much more there is to know about the person after they are married.)

And yet, it's not for EVERYONE to go.
(And why should everyone go when there are so many people groups in the United States?!)

We can't just think we know or understand someone else by watching them alone.
Have you traded your life for theirs?
Have you asked them questions?
Have you sought their perspective?
Have you been challenged to edit and change your way of thinking?

This must be done no matter where you are living. If you want to KNOW people -- KNOW them. Don't just "associate." Bleh.

I am thankful that the artist moves his models around.
The potter smashes and builds up, shapes and moves, preparing the clay pot to carry whatever items will bring him the greatest fame.

May the clay pots be faithful vessels, joyfully sitting wherever the potter puts them; never knowing when the arrangement might change.