Cross-Cultural Parenting 101
Episode 1 transcript
JOHN YODER: [00:00:00] Speaker: Hi, everybody. My name's John Yoder, and I am so glad you've decided to join us for this podcast, Cross Cultural Parenting. I want to start by telling you a story. It's my story, but it's your story, too. For the last 20 years, I have been meeting parents from all around the world, people like you.
A lot of that has happened near where I live in Minneapolis.
[00:00:25] You've invited me into your homes, into your celebrations, you've invited me into your churches. I've had the privilege of worshiping in more than 80 different immigrant churches here in Minnesota, of many different ethnicities, many different denominations.
And you have been so cordial, so warm in inviting me in.
[00:00:46] I have had absolutely marvelous lunches and tea and coffee with those of you who are from Mexico and Brazil, from Argentina, Ecuador, Guatemala, Venezuela, [00:01:00] Peru, and other Latin American countries.
I have had wonderful discussions with African friends from Nigeria, Liberia, Sudan, Ethiopia, Egypt, Kenya, Rwanda, and several more.
[00:01:16] For 13 years, Sherry and I lived in Beijing, China, from 2004 to 2017. And from there, I had the chance to make seven different trips to Russia and other countries who had been part of the Soviet Union. I've been to Vladivostok, to Khabarovsk, to Komsomolsk, to Baku in Azerbaijan, to Tbilisi in the Republic of Georgia, and have met with Russian pastors and Christians here in the state of Minnesota.
[00:01:44] During those years in Beijing, I had the opportunity to travel to many different Asian countries, in addition to meeting lots of Asians here in Minnesota. So I've had the privilege of being to India, Nepal, South Korea, [00:02:00] Indonesia, Myanmar, Malaysia, Singapore, Vietnam, and others.
And of course, the country and the people that I know best outside the United States are Chinese.[00:02:11] And so to all of our Chinese friends out there, I want to say a big Ni Hao. Wo shi Beijing Guoji Jiaohui de Zhang Wen Mushi. Which means I'm Pastor Zhang Wen of the Beijing International Christian Fellowship. There was a day years ago when I could actually preach in Mandarin. Those days are gone because I've been back in the West for seven years.
[00:02:34] Whoever you are, and wherever you're from, I want you to know that I have been welcomed, and loved, and had just marvelous fellowship with people from many different lands around the world. Most of the time, when we get together, I'll ask you about your homeland, what it was like where you grew up. and how it is you came to the United States.
[00:02:55] And you have told me absolutely amazing stories. [00:03:00] Some of you said, I fled the civil war in Sudan on foot, walked hundreds of miles to another country, and lived in a refugee camp until I got to come to the U. S. Some of you said, during the Civil War in Liberia, I hid in the bushes until I was able to leave the country.
[00:03:20] Others of you said, I had a good IT job in my homeland and I came to the U. S. with a work visa and a six figure income in hand. Some of you said, I won the lottery. That's how I got to come here. Others said, I walked here from Guatemala, on foot--twice. Some said, I came here for graduate studies. And some said, I came here to raise the babies of my child in graduate studies to be grandma or grandpa so they could focus on school.
[00:03:54] Some of you said, I've come here on behalf of my extended family back home. I'm the one with the [00:04:00] best education and health, and I am here to make a good income, and wire money, remunerations, home to support my extended family. And some of you said, I came here to be with my spouse, my kids.
Those of you who have come here and you're Christians, I am absolutely amazed by the devoutness of your spiritual lives.
[00:04:24] You pray more earnestly, more fervently than we Americans do. You fast more often than we do. You seem to depend on God more for daily guidance.
And you plant churches with few resources. You don't wait until you have a building and a budget and a constitution. You just get people together and start meeting. [00:04:46] And you're amazingly gifted at winning other first generation like yourself to Christ. You're really passionate about back home, and whether it's planting churches or missions, or whether you're doing [00:05:00] relief work or community development, whatever it is to bless the people of your beloved homeland, you're amazingly gifted, you're amazingly strong.
[00:05:10] I am so glad that you've taken the time to listen into this podcast. Your listening in says a lot about you. It tells me that you deeply love your adult children and grandchildren. It tells me that you want to see each one of them discover happy, fulfilling lives. But it also says to me that not everything turned out the way you wanted, the way you hoped.
[00:05:33] And now that your children are out of the nest, they've left the home, your influence over their daily lives is greatly diminished, and you're out of fresh ideas about what to do next.
I love talking to parents like you. I've been listening to parents like you for years, both in Beijing and back here in Minneapolis. [00:05:53] I understand the struggle that you face in parenting, because you grew up in one culture, and your [00:06:00] kids have grown up in a very different culture, and it can be really hard for you to understand each other. Specifically, it can be hard to convey the value of the Christian faith to children whose needs are very different from yours.
[00:06:14] At the same time, I've also been listening to your American born adult children. The struggles that they face and the struggles that you face are very different. I know the things that you say about your adult kids, but I also know the things that your adult kids say about you.
[00:06:36] Both sides feel misunderstood by the other. Both sides see ways the other ought to change. And so, first generation parents say, "John, how do I change my kids?" And your American born kids say, "John, how do I change my parents?" And here's the thing, You're both right.
In that process [00:07:00] of talking with multicultural young adults across the US [00:07:04] and in Canada, Britain, Europe, I have encountered marvelous young adults, ones like your kids, but ones that deeply love Jesus Christ and they're walking on a good life path. You can hear their voices on our other podcast, Cross Cultural Voices. It's a sister podcast to this one. And it's designed specifically for multicultural young adults who are at least open to exploring Christianity as a way to a better life.
[00:07:36] Now, for those of you who ask, "John, Reverend Yoder, how do I change my kids?" Here's the answer. You can't. I can't.
Talk to any marriage counselor and they will tell you that if a couple comes in and both people says, "I want you to change my spouse", they're going to [00:08:00] fail. Marriage counseling works when two people come in and each of them say, "Well, this isn't quite working out, are there ways I can change to improve our marriage?"
[00:08:14] So, your kids are watching you, and if they believe that your goal is to fit them inside your cultural mold, they will push back, they will resist. But if they see in you a willingness to learn, a willingness to adapt, maybe even to apologize about some things in the past you wish you wouldn't have said or done, [00:08:39] then they're likely to respond much more positively to you. A little humility goes a long way.
Please understand that when I ask you to change, I am not saying in any way that there is something wrong with the language or the culture of your homeland. There isn't. [00:09:00] There isn't necessarily anything wrong with your parenting style. [00:09:04] It's probably the parenting style you learned because it works well in your home country. Here's the problem. You don't live in your home country anymore.
Your kids attended American schools, and they learned a completely different set of rules than you learned when you grew up. When Sherry and I lived in China for 13 years, we had to learn how to speak Mandarin, how to eat with chopsticks, how to ride crowded subways, and how to use the squatty potty. [00:09:36] If we had kids who attended Chinese schools, They would be preparing for the gaokao college entrance exams, which are completely different and unrelated from Western college exam systems.
I know you understand that. You understood that when you move to the U. S. or to Canada or to Britain, you're going to have to learn English.[00:10:00] You knew that the traffic regulations would be different. Maybe you'd have to learn to drive on a different side of the road. You knew that the IRS would be different than the tax systems back home. But there was a change that many of you never anticipated. And that was your children wouldn't think like you.
[00:10:22] And for many of you, that has been the most disheartening, discouraging part of moving to the U. S. I hear your frustration. I understand your pain. Many of you come from cultures where older men are very highly regarded as authority figures. And now, you've come to a country that empowers young single women.
[00:10:48] And I know that's very hard for many to accept. And it can be really hard for you to accept that in certain ways, you need to learn how from them. I also [00:11:00] know that many of today's young people aren't walking on a good path, but there is still a need for both generations to learn from one another.
That's why we've launched these two separate podcasts.[00:11:15] This one is called Cross Cultural Parenting and I will be your primary presenter. The other podcast is called Cross Cultural Voices. In it, we've assembled a team of young people that you can trust. I personally vet every author, every speaker, every host who shares on that platform.
It has been just a joy for me to get to know so many gifted multicultural young people who can speak effectively to the lives of your adult children.[00:11:46] These are all people who accept the Word of God as truth, who live out godly daily lives, and that will speak to people of any denominational background. [00:12:00]
Just a brief word about the background of our podcast. They are ministries of the non profit organization, Immigrant Ministry Connections, which I founded in 2019. [00:12:11] Its purpose is to share God's love with those in their first and second generations living in the U. S. and in other Western countries. We serve many ethnicities, we serve many denominations, and you can learn more about our beliefs and our history at our website, www.immigrantministry.com.
For all of you who are discouraged about the possibility of the second generation finding their way, I want to share with you a message of hope. [00:12:39] This is the story of one of the marvelous leaders you're going to hear in our other podcast, Sam Chacko pastors Loft City Church in Richardson, Texas.
His family came to the U. S. from India when he was three years old. His dad had a full time job and for decades pastored on the side. [00:13:00] And over time, Sam became the English language youth pastor of that Indian church.
[00:13:06] The young people really responded well to Sam and to his wife. They responded so well that a group of churches in the Dallas area invited Sam to consider starting an English language second generation church. Things began to go well, but they ended with a lot of hurt. And a lot of [00:13:28] wounding.
SAM CHACKO: In 2003, I met my wife, moved to Dallas, got married, a series of events, hard events in the beginning season of our marriage, but we joined an Indian community here in Dallas and really fell in love with that community and thought that we were going to be there for a long time.
[00:13:45] We, because of my dad having been in ministry so long and me having done seminary work, I started preaching at the church. I started serving with the high school kids and it was a sweet community and we thought this is where God was calling [00:14:00] us. A few years later the church asked if we would consider being the youth pastors of the church and we said yes, the church said yes, the board said yes, unfortunately there were people in the church that were opposed to it, a lot of it for cultural reasons.
[00:14:12] We didn't have youth pastors in India. We don't need youth pastors here. The moment we get a youth pastor here, the kids will not want to worship with us and they will have their own service. And then they'll start inviting people who are part of different cultures and we'll lose our culture and identity as an Indian church.
[00:14:26] And unfortunately, our names are caught in the middle of it. And it got really ugly to the point where some anonymous letters are going out. Things were being said that the weekend that our second son was born, my wife and I left that Indian church and we thought. Um, we thought ministry was done and we knew that we would never go back to an Indian church. [00:14:46] And so we in many ways felt like exiles from our own community as well as not fitting in to the majority community that was around us.
JOHN YODER: [00:14:55] Speaker: Can you hear the sadness in Sam's voice, the pain in the [00:15:00] last few sentences? That he shared there. Sam and his wife were disillusioned with the church. They doubted if they would ever find any church where they would fit in and be accepted, whether it was Indian, American, or anything else.
[00:15:15] Would they ever find a place where they'd be at home? Now, some of you might say, "John, hang on for a minute. You told us you were gonna give us a story of hope, a positive story. This is not a story of hope". Hang on. We haven't come to the end of the story yet. Sam and his wife went through a period of healing, but after they did, they started Loft City Church and saw some amazing things.
[00:15:40] So here's the rest of Sam's story.
SAM CHACKO:[00:15:42] So, series of events, some of those kids from the Bible study, that church came and asked if we would do a Bible study with them. Eventually that Bible study just starts growing, skipping a lot of Parts here, but we see that Bible study grow to 150 [00:16:00] and then we start debating a couple years in if we're a church or a Bible study, there are people who are coming to our Bible study.
[00:16:07] We're not going anywhere else.
And we start praying and discerning what God was calling of us and discern that God was calling us to plant a church. And we did all the work to plant a church, found a space, did the renovations. And right before we were launching several. Pastors in the Indian community began to attack us where they just started saying that we were a cult leader out of fear of losing their kids, and we thought we would have over a hundred people to join us when we launched and we Ended up with about 20 people on launch day.
[00:16:36] It was one of the hardest seasons, and it was really hard, it was really difficult. And in God's grace and kindness, he blessed the church. We struggled with 20 people for a couple years, and then in that season, God started bringing the nations to us. And today, our church has Close to 30 some ethnicities, people from almost every background.
JOHN YODER: [00:16:57] Speaker: Now, isn't that a great story? [00:17:00] Sam and his wife went through a difficult time, but they planted a multicultural church that today has people from more than 30 different ethnic backgrounds. In this story, Jesus is the big hero, but Sam and his wife are heroes, too. But there's a hero missing from this story: the first generation.
For years, Sam was not welcomed back into first generation Indian churches because he had something that was worshipping in English. And the fear is that the second generation would lose their love for the Hindi language and for the Indian culture. God has used Sam and his wife and his team to bring hope and healing to a lot of people, but God did it without the involvement of the first generation.
It doesn't have to be that way. I can tell you other stories where first generation parents fully empowered their children. These [00:18:00] parents number one priority was that their children fall in love with Jesus, that they lead healthy lives, that they walk a good life path.
And it was okay with these parents if that meant their children preferred English, had their own leadership team, and used a church name that wasn't even remotely similar to their parents church.
[00:18:25] That's the decision that you need to make. Jesus Christ has all power in heaven and on earth, and he is changing lives. I am seeing him raise up many young leaders like Sam. But the question to you is, Do you want to be part of that?
Brothers and sisters, I know that the words that I have just spoken are very hard to hear. [00:18:49] I'm sure you're already aware of all of this at some level. Letting go of expectations regarding your children is a process and it takes time. [00:19:00] So I want to encourage you to keep listening in. I want you to listen in to the Cross Cultural Voices podcast for young people. It will help you understand what the gospel sounds like in ways that are attractive to the newer generation.
[00:19:15] And I want you to keep listening in to this Cross Cultural Parenting Podcast. We are going to discover in simple terms, how your kids think, how they learn, and the issues that matter to them.
I'd like you to request our free guidebook, Five Steps to Influencing Your Adult Children for Christ. When you do, you will have my email address. [00:19:38] I'd love to hear from you. I'd love to hear your questions, your feedback, your needs. Friends, there is no other podcast quite like this. You and I are on a journey together, and Jesus Christ will be with us every step of the way.
