Refugees Really Are our Challenge

Memphis Street Art by Sean Davis / flickr

Every age is given a challenge.  What are we going to do with the aching problems of our time? Once it was the cursed Amalekites or Jebusites.  Or the Babylonians. Or the Romans. Or the Jews. Or the Indians. Or the slaves. Or the North or the South. Or those strange people so different from us. 

I keep remembering what Thomas Mann said of great literature, “It is, it always is, however much we try to say it was.” And so I put down the Bible beside those words. Every generation has tried to whittle down its message, cosmetize its meaning, explain away what God really said. Remember what the Devil whispered in Adam’s ear there at the beginning: “Did God really say…?” That whispering is still with us. 

 Every age must face whatever challenge that God brings down the pike. Seemingly it never ends. When I was a young Pastor it was race—what are we going to do with the Ne-groes? In my little rural Kentucky church it was closer to home: What are we going to do with the poor that live down our roads in shacks? Or can the divorced serve on…(and you can fill in the blanks.) Monthly at the meetings of the local Reverends it was always: liberal or conservative. Don’t you believe every word of the Bible literally? 

But the race thing stayed with me even after I put my belongings in a moving van and moved to greener pastures. Later it was the Vietnam War and what are we going to say about those 58,000 that were killed in a foolish war. Running through so much of it all was: What will the Bible say about: Gays, poor folks, atheists, those who don’t believe the way we do. Often then—as even now—it’s the women. And then drugs came in with a vengeance and it has torn apart lives and families and whole communities. And then 9-11 happened and we had to add Muslims to our list. But, as of late, we struggle with the refugee problem. It is an international dilemma. For people all over are fleeing destruction, murder, hunger, rape and their bombed-out homes. They risked their lives to get on tiny boats or travel thousands of miles with children in their arms looking for freedom or a job or just a place not so un-safe. 

And so the American church, as others must face, these brown-skinned people desperate and looking at us for help. Walls won’t solve this problem. Neither will Homeland Security or pathetic fearful edicts coming from Washington. The last parable Jesus ever gave was: “Lord, when do we see you hungry, naked, afraid…?” We cannot explain his words away any more than we can explain away children ripped from their parents’ arms and taken to God-knows-where.  Folks—these folks are to be one of our primary challenges. Silence won’t solve it. And hatred damn sure won’t make them go away. They just keep coming hoping…hoping.

What got me to thinking about our present challenge is a splendid article by Nicholas Kristof who writes not only from the head but also the heart. Teresa Todd was a arrested the other day. She is a lawyer for her city and county. Driving down the road she saw a couple of people waving desperately. She stopped. Three brown-skinned young people needed not only a ride but help. They were hungry, one was very ill. All were scared. They had left El Salvador then fled to Guatemala trying to escape murder and rape and nightmare lives. So Teresa  picked them up ands down the road a policeman stopped her, dragged the three young people out of the car arrested not only them but Theresa as well. The charge was “harboring illegals.” They searched her car, took her possessions and took them all to jail.

The writer, Kristof tells the woman's story interspersed with the parable Jesus told of the Good Samaritan who stopped to help somebody in need. Read his article. I don’t know exactly what we can do but we can know that the policy of this government is wrong, wrong, wrong. And the attitude of Christian folks is not exactly a Matthew 25 response. Of course we have to protect our citizens and protect our borders. (What about Canada?)

But we also have to put down the things of our lives beside the Bible and ask, tellingly, what does this have to do with us. And if we have no answer it is high time to board up the churches and just catch up with whatever we watch on the web. “It is, it alway is, however much we say it was.”

photo by Johnny Jet / flickr

--Roger Lovette / rogerlovette.blogspot.com