Loving our Neighbour
If you’re not in the Twin Cities it’s hard to convey what’s happening here.
Sunday morning … I knew I would address the murder of Renee Good. I knew I would address the illegal detention of a refugee who has connections with some of our church members. I knew I would address the needs of an Hispanic congregation our church has a relationship with and meets in our building.
What I didn’t anticipate was that within an hour of our worship service ending, members of our congregation would be bringing food to Christians from that Hispanic congregation because they were afraid to leave their homes due to the terrorising tactics of the American government’s ICE agents.
It all started a few moments before the end of our worship service when my wife, Jenny, received a text from a member of the Hispanic congregation saying they were not going to be holding their worship service out of fear of ICE. My eyes filled with tears as I related this to our congregation. Our church had already purchased groceries for their members to take home after worship as a way to help them avoid additional trips to the store. The food was there.
We asked folks if they could stay and help pack groceries and deliver them to families who needed them. I was overwhelmed by the response, our church loves their neighbours. Our church would happily proclaim the words of Deuteronomy 27:19, “‘Cursed is anyone who withholds justice from the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow.’ Then all the people shall say, ‘Amen!’”
As folks were packing boxes of food to take to our neighbours living in fear I turned to one of our elders and commented, “This is more beautiful than any work of art.” We had big smiles on our faces. This was about loving our neighbours.
In my wildest dreams I never imagined I’d be delivering food to my brothers and sisters in Christ who were hiding from government authorities, at least not here in the USA.
Boxes were packed, cars were loaded, addresses were googled and off we went. We were told that for deliveries to houses people may not answer the door. This was out of fear that the people at the door might be ICE. As our church members pulled into neighbourhoods to drop off the food, there were multiple calls between Jenny who was coordinating things on our end and a member of the Hispanic church who was coordinating things on their end. All those who needed food on Sunday, received it.
The whole thing felt like a subversive, clandestine operation of loving your neighbour.
Jenny and I took food to the pastor and his wife. We talked, we wept, we prayed. He rubbed his arm and told us that it was only because of the colour of his skin that they’re afraid. Tragically, he’s right to be afraid in today’s America, especially here in Minnesota. We know of legal immigrants who have been detained and moved out of the state.
Our experience, our lived reality at the moment, is that of a society where people are in hiding from the authorities who are seeking to detain people, refusing them their right of habeas corpus, and deporting them without any kind of judicial hearing.
I’m trying to process how I feel. There’s anger at the injustice and the deliberate dehumanisation of people, it’s something we’ve seen from Donald Trump since the day he declared his run for the presidency and attacked Mexicans. There’s a sadness that some folks who call themselves Christians seem to be OK with this, I think they’ve forgotten what the Bible teaches. There’s a numbness that keeps me from falling apart. There’s a passion that drives me forward in the pursuit of justice. There’s a stubbornness that won’t back down.
By the way, I love our church.
“For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat.”
Our church brought food to those who needed it. It seems simple enough, but there are those who would deny these folks food.
“I was a stranger and you invited me in.”
This is a big one. In God’s economy no one is illegal. It seems obvious to me that immigrants are strangers. Do we welcome them or reject them? Scripture is clear on this, we are to welcome the foreigner.
Some will say, “But they have to come here legally.” I’d challenge that. First, you don’t find any contingencies added to the biblical command to love the foreigner. Secondly, people who have come here legally, as refugees, asylum seekers, or with temporary protective status, have been victims of executive orders and changing laws that can move them from legal to illegal. Finally, “Here there is no Gentile or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all.” The distinctions the world makes are done away with in Christ.
As Daniel Groody writes in A Theology of Migration, "Most migrants who break civil laws by crossing borders without proper documentation do so because they are first of all obeying the laws of human nature, such as the need to find work, food and dignity. To criminalize them compounds the injustice they already experience."
As Christians we have to remember the enemy is not the immigrant or the refugee. The enemy is the systems and powers that caused them to become refugees in the first place and pushed them to cross foreign the borders in search of a better life.
Perhaps some Christians need to be reminded that Jesus was not a citizen. If he had been a citizen he would not have been crucified as it was illegal to crucify a Roman citizen. The only way Christians can have a crucified Lord is because Jesus didn’t hold legal citizenship in the Roman Empire.
Of the twelve apostles only one, Paul, was a citizen. The others enjoyed none of the legal protection and rights of citizenship.
Next time you see a crucifix remember this was only possible because Jesus didn’t have the protection of citizenship.
We’re ready to do whatever is needed to help our neighbours.
“Reform your ways and your actions, and I will let you live in this place. Do not trust in deceptive words and say, ‘This is the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord, the temple of the Lord!’ If you really change your ways and your actions and deal with each other justly, if you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow and do not shed innocent blood in this place, and if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, then I will let you live in this place, in the land I gave your ancestors for ever and ever.”
Jeremiah 7:4-7
“This is what the Lord Almighty said: ‘Administer true justice; show mercy and compassion to one another. Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other.’”
Zechariah 7:9-10
