When Cultures Collide

One of the shows that I watch whenever I can is CBS Sunday Morning, a show that has a variety of pieces each week that run from editorial and feature stories to hard news and opinion. Years ago it was hosted by Charles Kuralt, one of my all-time favorite feature journalists who used to travel the highways and byways of this great country looking for stories on the backroads from coast to coast. The current host of the program is Charles Osgood who took over the hosting chores after the death of Kuralt a number of years ago.

I always know when the show is starting because of the famous opening theme finishing with the trumpet flourish. It reminds me of a place in Kennebunkport, Maine that Janet and I used to visit from time to time in the early nineties. And the first several minutes give you the lay of the land for the next 90 minutes. Sunday, Mother’s Day, there was a great reunion story about a young man, David, and his mother. She had been raised in southern Venezuela, in an Amazon rain forest and fell in love with an American anthropologist. They were eventually married and returned to his home in New Jersey. But after three children and years living in America, she just couldn’t continue to be away from her beloved homeland in South America.

Now I’m not talking about some small town in Venezuela. The nearest landing strip was three days from the nomadic village and the people rarely even wore clothes. They ate tarantulas and piranhas. I can’t imagine the clash that this tribal woman had to endure – straddling two worlds. Of course, the unasked question is why a mother would leave her three children and return to her homeland without them – but that is what happened.

Her oldest son, the centerpiece of the story this past week, harbored feelings of anger, abandonment, betrayal and a host of other emotions that are very understandable given the circumstances. He even concocted a story that his mother had died in a car crash so he wouldn’t have to deal with questions about the absence of his mother. But the emotion of the story escalated when he came across a book that his father had written years earlier about the woman who would ultimately become David’s mother. His heart turned from hatred and hurt to a strong desire to reunite with his mother. But in order to do that, David would have to travel to the Amazon.

And that is exactly what he did. The reunion was awesome and David has made several trips back to visit his mother during the subsequent years. What struck me about me about the story was the fact that David’s heart was turned from negative to positive in an instant. Only God can do that. Because God knows our hearts and He already knows the outcome of every story in our lives.

The verse for tonight reflects God’s ability to turn our hearts. We are told, in 1 Kings 18:37, “Answer me, O LORD, answer me, so these people will know that you, O LORD, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.” Notice that God is the one who turns our hearts from anger to forgiveness – from abandonment to unity. My encouragement this evening is that God wants to change your heart – regardless of the kinds of clashes you may be experiencing. My prayer is that you will trust God as the leader of your life and that you will go to Him when you need to have a change of heart – after all, we all have relationship issues that could be better and God can steer you in the right direction. Have a great day  in the Lord, grace and peace…