Who am I?

I have just returned from a week in the US for the wedding of a very close friend (congratulations Jeremy and Sarah).  The week had its ups and downs.  It as almost like a vision trip for returning to the US after my time overseas.  I got a sneak peak of what life will be like in three and half months.

A lot of things came across my path that caused me to think and search.  The questions of who I am and what defines me came as I traveled between two places that, in some ways, feel like home.  I feel like I left home to go home and then left home to return home.  I am an American, I grew up in the US, the US is home.  At the same time, I've spent the majority of the last two years in Turkey.  I have done a lot of adjusting here.   This is where my work and purpose is at the moment.  I feel pretty normal here (though there are always gawking eyes to remind me that I don't fit in as much as I might think).  I have two normals.  This struck me as I pretty easily slipped back into American life driving the freeways of Detroit with my brother.  Differences in scenery and culture that were a little shocking when I returned to the US in the past were just there this time.  I don't know if this makes sense, maybe you have to experience it.

Culture is a fascinating and confusing thing.  My experiences living overseas lead me to wonder how binding culture is.  Will someone who has grown up in the United States always be an "American"?  How much of our original culture do we unknowingly carry with us.  I have seen how quickly people can adapt to another culture, but I have also seen how deeply engrained culture can be.  This makes me wonder about my great, great, great, great grandparents.  They, probably like some of your ancestors (at least if you are like the average American), came to a strange place from far away and were thrown into a new world.  For most going back was never an option.  It was sink or swim in their new world.  What of their culture did they try to hold on to?  What did they try to cast off?.  

I am nearing the end of a two year cross-cultural immersion and I find myself asking the question "who am I?"  I don't know if my identity is growing or shrinking.  Sometimes I feel like the Dan who has experienced a lot and is a well-traveled "man of the world".  Maybe in this way my understanding has grown and I am able to relate to more and more people.  At other times I feel like my identity is "smaller", made up of and connected to less things.  I feel like just Dan, not American Dan, UM graduate Dan, and not economics and political science student Dan.  All the ornaments that have been hung on the tree of my person to form my identity suddenly mean less when they are pulled out of context.  This is kind of freeing as those things don't actually define me anyways.  I am defined by my being in Christ.  He is my constant no matter where I find myself.  He never loses meaning because He is never out of context. 

When I enter a new place I love to say to myself, "The LORD is the Lord of this place too."  Whether it has been on a beach in Thailand, a runway in Uzbekistan, or a crowded street in Turkey, the LORD is always Lord.  As much as I like to travel and explore, sometimes when I am in a new and strange place I get a cold, empty feeling in my stomach that voices the loneliness of being a stranger not just in a foreign place, but in this world.  Its in those moments when I really feel the immediacy of my need to run to Him and be found in Him.  The Lord has used this stripping away of the familiar to send me running to Him.