We are hidden immigrants in our home country.
For the past two decades, our family has lived in Muslim communities in South Asia.
We are not Asian. But we don’t feel fully American either.
We look like we belong in America, and our passports say we do. But we often feel odd, different, and out of place.
Conversations are also uncomfortable. What do people talk about? When do we just listen and learn? How do we put our “odd-ness” out there for others to engage with?
We want to blend in. But we want to be who we are too. What does that look like?
We are stretched between continents.
These are the questions that rumble about in our heads.
Each member of my family experiences these challenges and questions in different ways. But for all of us, church is where we feel the most out of place—even though it’s where we want to feel most at home. The questions in our heads shout the loudest in church.
Meanwhile, we miss the place we call home—our dust-covered house and the noisy neighborhood in Southeast Asia. We miss our friends and our routines. We miss the spicy curries, the monkeys in the trees outside our balcony, and the cycle rickshaws that take us to the market.
We are stretched between continents. And it reminds us to look forward to our heavenly home—to the city whose designer and builder is God (Hebrews 11:10).
But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city. — Hebrews 11:16