Adopted and Adaptive: The Role Of Biculturals In World Redemption
by Stanley K. Inouye

Recently, my wife and I adopted a little baby girl. As adoptive parents, we were concerned about how and when we would tell our daughter that she was adopted. The people at the adoption agency recommended that we purchase a particular children's book entitled, "Why Was I Adopted?", by Carol Livingston. They suggested we place this book visibly on a shelf or table and read it to our child from time to time as she grows up. By doing this, our daughter would always know that she was adopted. We would not have to endure the tension and apprehension of deciding when, where, and how to "break the news" to her, as if it were some dreaded, highly contagious, terminal disease.

When I was growing up, I always feared that perhaps I had been adopted. I didn't look much like either parent, or my brothers, or sister. One day, when I needed a copy of my birth certificate, my mother said she couldn't find it. I felt sure that my suspicion had been confirmed. Even though I had been just as cared for and loved as the other children in my family, I felt that being adopted meant something unfortunate and pitiful and that people felt sorry for you.

However, as I read "Why Was I Adopted?" I was surprised and pleased that adoption was portrayed as being something extra special. In fact, the author warns the adopted child not to be arrogant toward others who haven't been granted such a privilege. For my wife and I, who for ten years had wanted and tried so hard to have children, adoption is just that special, and Heather, our daughter, is an extraordinary gift from God.

Our experience with adoption serves to illustrate a point that I think is important—God often has a positive view of the very things we ourselves and society view as our weaknesses, liabilities, and stumbling blocks. Paradoxically, these things may be, in God's eyes, the very means to fulfilling a unique function and calling he has for us.

As an example, let us look at an adopted child in the Bible. His name? Moses. Most of us are familiar with the life of Moses and the role he played in leading the children of Israel out from beneath the oppressive foot of Egyptian rule. As you remember from the book of Exodus, Moses was born a Hebrew, an oppressed and enslaved minority in the land of Egypt. As an early attempt at population control, Pharaoh, the king of Egypt, enacted an ordinance that called for the extermination of all male babies born to the Hebrews.

Moses' mother kept Moses as long as she could. Then she hid her son in the bulrushes of the river where the daughter of Pharaoh bathed. Pharaoh's daughter found the baby and recognizing him to be Hebrew, decided to prevent his death. Moses' sister, who had concealed herself in order to see what was to become of her infant brother, then rushed to Pharaoh's daughter to volunteer the services of a Hebrew woman, his mother, to nurse the baby for her. Pharaoh's daughter agreed and Moses continued to be raised in early childhood by his biological mother. Moses was later adopted and named by Pharaoh's daughter. He was granted the advantages and privileges attendant to being a prince, growing up and educated under the roof of the king. As a result, Moses was not only a minority and adopted, but was also bicultural. His primary socialization was Hebrew and his later child development was Egyptian.

As a minority, adopted, and bicultural person, Moses encountered several problems that many of us who share some of those characteristics have experienced. For example, he had to ask himself, "Who are my people? With whom do I identify most fully?" When he saw an Egyptian smiting a Hebrew, Moses had to make a choice. His decision perhaps attests to the high degree of influence of early child-rearing on personality formation and values. Moses slew the Egyptian.

When Pharaoh heard what Moses had done, Pharaoh sought to kill him. However, rather than being protected and harbored by the Hebrews for whom Moses had killed and jeopardized his own position of power and privilege, they too, viewed him with suspicion and refused to help him. Alienated and rejected by both sides, Moses fled to the land of Midian. There he met and helped the seven daughters of the priest of Midian. Whether due to his dress, demeanor, or use of language, they thought Moses to be an Egyptian, another reflection of his confusion over ethnic identity.

Moses married Zipporah, one of the daughters of the priest of Midian and for forty years learned to live the independent, isolated life of a nomadic shepherd in the harsh desert north of the Arabian peninsula. Moses and Zipporah had a son. Moses named him Gershom, which means "alien" or "foreigner". Moses chose that name because as he said, "I have been an alien in a foreign land".

Moses had moved from being born and named a member of a poor, oppressed, and dependent minority to enjoying the power and privilege of the wealthy, dominant, and yet equally dependent majority in that same society. From this bicultural setting, Moses became an immigrant, experiencing a cross cultural context, developing an independent character and learning the survival skills needed to subsist in a foreign and unpredictable land.

Within such a cross-cultural framework, God called Moses to lead the Israelites out of Egypt. And what was Moses' response? He leveled three objections to God. Firstly, Moses asked, "Who am I, that I should go unto Pharaoh, and that I should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt?" (Exodus 3:11, KJV). What I hear Moses saying is, "Are you kidding me, God? The Pharaoh wants to kill me and the Israelites don't trust me. The Egyptians reject me because I'm a Hebrew and the Hebrews reject me because I'm Egyptian. Do you have all your marbles, God? Are you sure I'm the right person for the job?"

Secondly, Moses speculated, "But, behold, they will not believe me, nor hearken unto my voice; for they will say, 'The Lord hath not appeared unto thee.'" (Exodus 4:1, KJV). In colloquial English, Moses projects Israel's response to him: "It's not logical that God would appear or speak to you. You're not very Hebrew. You were educated an Egyptian. You're married to a Midianite half-breed. You've been wandering around the desert for forty years. You're not a recognized religious leader with a reputable theological education. Has the heat of the desert baked your brain? Why should we believe you, a stranger, who has been gone for all this time? Why should we believe that our God appeared to you and appointed you to lead us victoriously out of the shadow of all of Pharaoh's armies?"

Thirdly, Moses pleaded, "I am not eloquent...but I am slow of speech and of a slow tongue." (Exodus 4:10, KJV). My interpretation of Moses' words is, "I don't speak Hebrew or the Egyptian language very well. My Hebrew vocabulary is that of a child, my command of the Egyptian language is rusty and both are tainted by a Midianite's drawl. It takes me so long to translate, I speak slowly, and then the words don't come out too well."

God answered Moses' reservations but only after Moses made the first move to obey God by asking his father-in-law for permission to go back to Egypt. Then, with the knowledge that all those who sought his life were dead and with permission granted, Moses and his family packed off for Egypt.

However, Moses was still not too confident in himself or his God. And as a result of his lack of faith, God sought to kill Moses. Why? Because Moses took a safety precaution just in case God's plan failed. He didn't circumcise his son. That way, if the children of Israel were not freed, his son would not be recognized as a Hebrew and therefore, not be enslaved. Fortunately, Zipporah, Moses's wife, took a sharp stone and circumcised their son, and Moses was spared.

Moses repeatedly registered his lack of confidence in his ability to speak both to the Hebrews and the Egyptians. Moses said that he didn't have "circumcised lips." This is a strange phrase that again reflects Moses' lack of belief. Circumcision was a sign of covenant between God and the descendants of Abraham. Certainly God had covenanted to be Moses' lips. Moses did not accept God's covenant promise to speak through what he viewed as his primary weakness. God had to appease Moses' insecurity by appointing Moses' older brother, Aaron, to speak for Moses.

The question then arises, if Aaron was going to do all the speaking anyway, why didn't the omniscient God choose Aaron in the first place? Humanly speaking, Aaron had more logical qualifications. Aaron was of the same primary Hebrew lineage of Levi and Moses. Aaron was even the first-born son, Moses being the second-born. Aaron suffered along with the children of Israel throughout his life. He never left. Aaron was a recognized and trusted leader and an effective communicator to Egyptian and Hebrew alike. We don't find Aaron resisting and offering squeamish excuses to God. So why did God choose Moses instead of Aaron? Apparently, some of the very reasons Moses cited as why he wasn't the right person for the job were the very qualifications God had engineered in his life to equip Moses to fulfill His purpose. Moses' minority, bicultural, and immigrant experiences prepared him to carry out God's intentions.

In what ways are being a minority, a bicultural, and an immigrant, strategic assets for fulfilling unique roles in God's plan for world redemption? I believe that those who are so privileged to suffer the insecurities and tensions of intercultural and cross-cultural lifestyles develop within themselves certain character traits and skills that especially equip them to serve as leaders of the people of God at times of dramatic transition and extension.

The example of Moses is not isolated. The Apostle Paul is another case in point. If Paul did not have to reconcile throughout his life the tensions between the two cultures of his background, would he have possessed the analytical objectivity to see beneath the cultural and religious form of circumcision to its essential meaning? Through Paul's influence Gentile converts did not have to be physically circumcised to become members of the spiritually circumcised family of God. Would Paul have been able to be so adaptive, accommodating, and innovative in "becoming all things to men," had it not been for his bicultural upbringing? He was able to speak with such acuity to the Stoic and Epicurian philosophers in Athens because he was a bicultural person. Paul served as a cultural bridge, extracting essential meaning from Hebrew form and transferring that meaning into relevant, new, cultural forms.

As minorities and immigrants, Moses and Paul were able to develop the spiritual self-reliance to depend solely on God, to be cautious and yet know that risks must be taken. They had learned to respect and accommodate cultural differences that are not critically contrary to the character of God, and to identify with the poor, the oppressed, and the alienated of the world in any culture.

God calls each of us with the same call as Moses—to be instruments of liberation, bringing people to God, who will free them from all that oppresses them and holds them in bondage. What we view as our weaknesses, liabilities, and stumbling blocks, may be in God's eyes, the very substance of what equips us to fulfill His unique function and calling. God, indeed, "works all things together for good, to those who love God and are called according to His purpose." (Romans 8:28, KJV) God's power is perfected in our weaknesses. (II Cor. 12:9-10).

For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called; but God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise.... (I Cor. 1:26-27)

Yes, I believe God has a unique and strategic role for minorities, bicultural people, and immigrants in His plan for world redemption, both as cultural bridges and as cross-cultural interpreters on behalf of the transcultural God. You who are of such backgrounds, take a sound and proper estimate of yourselves. Neither be arrogant nor depreciate the gift of your minority, immigrant, or bicultural experiences. Use what your unique backgrounds have taught you for their God-intended purposes.

You who are not of such backgrounds, reach out to those who are, not out of pity or a paternalistic sense that they need you so desperately, but rather because your Lord has need of them and you need them. They are the ones who are squeezed between the cracks and crevasses of different cultures who will become the very sauce that intermingles the flavors of the cultures of humankind, preventing the stewpot we call planet earth from boiling over or exploding. They are the ones who will enable the human family to simmer as one harmonious whole, yielding a sweet, savoring aroma unto God. The Lord, our God, longs, and the entire creation groans, awaiting the adoption of the children of God.

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