When we as TCKs move to another country, a new school, or to a different environment, many of us automatically start to perceive new cultural behavior patterns. We may tend to observe, discern, ruminate, learn, and copy those new behaviors. Often we adapt to the culture around us to ‘fit in’, but as saved children of God, to what degree is adapting okay? Where do we draw the line? How do we know if a cultural belief or behavior contradicts the Bible? 

Africa Time

In Uganda, and where I lived in South Sudan, I had to face these questions first hand. Time runs a little differently than what I am used to. If someone said to meet at 12:30, for example, you would be considered late if you didn’t arrive at 12:15. This is the way it was in America, where I spent my early years; that was how I grew up, and was what I was taught. But when we moved to South Sudan, I was confronted with an entirely different system. 

Once, we were invited to a wedding in the village we lived in. We were to show up at 3 PM, and it would last until 8 PM. We, naturally, arrived at 2:30 PM. No one was there. There weren’t even chairs set up yet. We sat and waited. At about 4 o’clock, the first people started arriving. Chairs were soon set up, and at 5, the crowd came. Food was served, and at about 6, the bride and groom came. The wedding ceremony then lasted long into the night.

To my family and I, this was quite distasteful. To me, this reeked of laziness, and I was upset about it. But, after some time had passed and I was exposed to this behavior more and more, I realized it wasn’t necessarily wrong, it was just different, something I wasn’t used to.

I learned that when someone tells you to meet them somewhere at 3, you should start leaving at 3. That’s just the way they think. I eventually called this behavior ‘African Time’, as people did the same when I moved to Northern Uganda. Was ‘African Time’ something I should compromise on? Was this acceptable for me to change in, to better fit in with the people around me? Yes! While the behavior felt contrary to what I had grown up with, it was not contradicting anything in the Bible and was not a sin. So, I adopted ‘African Time’, but remember to put it away when in different countries.

However, there are times when compromise is not okay, and times when you can turn something into an idol. An idol is something you give more time to or are putting above God in your life. This could be anything, from entertainment to food. Even something “cultural”, like materialism, has the potential to become an idol in your life and needs to be dealt with cautiously. We should not adapt to all cultural behaviors, only those which could be used to give glory to God.

Drawing the Line

The Bible is also full of examples of people drawing the line, one of which is Daniel.

“But Daniel purposed in his heart that he would not defile himself with the portion of the king’s meat, nor with the wine which he drank: therefore he requested of the prince of the eunuchs that he might not defile himself.” – Daniel 1:8 KJV

Daniel drew a line and would not defile himself with the king’s food. But notice that he did not refuse, when taken into Babylonian captivity, to be educated as a Babylonian, or to be given a Babylonian name.

One of the things that separated God’s people from others in the Old Testament was strict rules on food and drink. It was to show the other nations their deeply held convictions to follow God and His instructions. For Daniel, eating the king’s food in Babylon was to go against his conscience and would stain his identity as a follower of God, not to mention being a sin.

Later in Daniel’s life, a decree went out that no one was to pray to anyone but the King, and Daniel refused to accept it. He did not cower in fear and pray in secret, but neither did he flaunt it and go out of his way to make a show of it. He did as he always did and continued to pray to his God. Daniel drew the line there as well and chose to honor his allegiance to God over the king.

Seeling His Truth and Wisdom

The line that we should draw, then, is quite clear. We are to draw the line wherever we would have to disobey God, or where we will compromise God’s will. As Christian TCKs, we should adapt to other cultural behaviors and norms to glorify God, not to make things easier for ourselves. Not only can adapting bring glory to God, it is a way to serve Him as well.

Sometimes it is wise to adapt to a culture to be respectful, seek peace with others, and—in cases where it is not sinful—we can try to adapt to the people we are with for the purpose of sharing the gospel with them later. “To the weak became I as weak, that I might gain the weak: I am made all things to all men, that I might by all means save some. And this I do for the gospel’s sake, that I might be partaker thereof with you.” (1 Cor. 9:22-23).

We need to have a clear line drawn to identify which things to change and when to change them, and we need to keep God in the center of it all. We can compromise our preferences, but not the principles of the Bible. We need to put Him first, above culture. Finally, adapting does not only apply on the outside but on the inside as well, to be changed to be more like Him (1 Jn. 2:6, Eph. 5:1-2). 

“But we all, with open face beholding as in a glass the glory of the Lord, are changed into the same image from glory to glory, even as by the Spirit of the Lord.” – 2 Corinthians 3:18