Niche: Where I Belong

Niche: (n) the status of an organism within its environment and community

The definition for niche has been imprinted in the back of my brain since Grade 8 Science class,back when I could read text once and literally retain it forever. Oh to have that brain back. But side track...

This past week, The Grove featured a week on the word niche. You can check out their posts and other featured posts here http://velvetashes.com/have-you-seen-january-18-2015/

I've been reading these posts all week, a hard lump growing on the inside of my chest, making it hard to swallow, hard to breathe.

Niche has to do with belonging, interacting, community. Environment.

What a word. And what a not definition of my life. Since I graduated almost 8 (where has the time gone????) years ago, I have lived in 4 different communities, spanning 2 Canadian provinces and one South Pacific nation. I have spent time in (rough estimate) 7 countries and interacted with numerous church bodies and people from literally all around the world.

In the past 8 months of being back in my home community, I've struggled to drive on the correct side of the road, know when doors are locked or unlocked, and how to turn on light switches. I've struggled to connect in church, with old friends, and how to make new friends. Relationships are different, activities are different, language is different. Summer was cold and now with the advent of ice and snow, shoes are difficult. Walking on ice and snow is especially difficult.

Please don't get me wrong. I love being right where God places me, and being in northern Alberta, is not something I regret. Even with the difficulties, or maybe even because of the difficulties, I laugh everyday, multiple times a day. God has given me an extra measure of joy for this season and my relationships are fuller and richer because of it.

But niche. Niche is hard. Where do I actually belong? Who is actually my family? Which church am I part of? I never imagined myself asking these questions. I always knew who I was and where I fit. Belonging was never something I questioned.

Early Friday morning as I was praying about this, crying about these issues, telling God I didn't know if I would ever have a home in the true sense of the word again, He spoke to me softly. I am your niche. Your belonging is in Me.

And slowly, over the past few days, that has begun to sink in. I belong in Christ. At His feet, I have home, family, belonging. His heart envelopes and engulfs who I am, where I will go, who I will encounter and what I will become.

I hear His whispers in every situation, and every time my compass looks like it will begin pointing the wrong direction, He points it back to Himself. In my search for belonging, in the midst of identity crisis , and the questions I have about my future, He is my niche. God is the One who creates my environment, my community, and He is the One who ordains how I act and interact within it.

I am living a life where my community is always going to be re-defined. One day, I'll return to living cross-culturally, and everything will be new again. There will always be new people and new situations to expand my life, my needs, my way of thinking, and I will always be changing in a direction opposite to the way my birth community is changing. It's the life I have chosen.

But if I can keep this one thing in mind, that God is where I belong. I think I'll be ok. My identity and my worth is found in Him, not on externals.

Do you struggle with belonging? Can you find your place at the feet of Christ?