Blending Home and Host Cultures

Today's devotional really started in 2014. At a training time, I was struck by how many things in our host culture and in the Bible revolve around forty days. Last year, I began reflecting on it again amidst recovering from surgery, but then dropped the study once I was well and busy with life again. With the new year, I am revisiting that study. Some points are longer and will require a lot more time. Today's passage was shorter than others and yet full of food for thought.

Often as expats overseas, we wage a battle within ourselves. How much do we become a part of the host culture and how much do we hang on to our passport country. Some forfeit their home culture completely, while others never embrace their host culture.  Our children are called Third Culture Kids because they take some of both to make their own new. One young man, who grew up a third culture kid in East Africa, entered our home one day and declared that it felt like home, the mix of the two. It was one of the greatest compliments I have ever received.
Though I feel like we do a good job of balancing the two, I often wonder.

In today's study of Genesis 50, I was able to see how Joseph found a balance between the two cultures. When his father, Israel aka Jacob, died, he wept over him. Then Joseph commanded the Egyptian physicians to embalm the body, which required forty days. As far as we know, this had not yet been a practice for the Israelites but Joseph does it here. After the proper period for Egyptian mourning was past, Joseph asked Pharoah's permission to take Israel to be buried, as his father made him promise.

Not only did Joseph and his brothers take their father to be buried. They were accompanied by Pharoah's servants, the elders of Egypt, as well as chariots and horsemen. They then mourned a sorrowful lamentation for Israel according to their own customs. What a testimony it must have been to all the Egyptians as well as the Canaanites living in the land at that time.

Likewise, when Joseph was dying, he made the sons of Israel promise to carry his bones up to the Promised Land when the time came. Additionally, when he died, he was embalmed and placed in a coffin in Egypt. A mummy?? Once again both cultures were to be honored in the observance of death.

This Joseph that had been sold into slavery by his brothers had become so much like the host culture that he was unable to be recognized by his brothers. He spoke the language of his new culture so clearly and dressed like them. However, when his family came to Egypt for food, his heart was touched. He had not forgotten his family, not brushed them aside. They were still near to his heart, such that he facilitated their moving into his host culture. He blended both his home culture and his host culture even in his death.

When we are in our host culture, we miss parts of our home culture. When in our home culture, we miss parts of our host culture. In the last year, I have come to realize that neither is going to ever completely fulfill my need for home. May I be able to find such a balance as Joseph in my life as an expat.