Some of what I will lay out here will sound strange and unchristian. But it comes from the Bible, and is part of a much larger discussion on mercy and justice. I’ll try to be brief.
It goes without saying that all persons everywhere (including Christians) have a duty to look out for widows, orphans and sojourners. But…
- Are all widows, orphans, and sojourners the same?
- As far as the Bible is concerned, is there such a thing as “illegal sojourners”?
- Are kings (presidents, tribal chieftains) supposed to prioritize the care of their own people over foreigners?
- Are churches supposed to prioritize the care of members over pagans?
How we answer those questions will depend largely on how we understand ‘justice’ and ‘mercy’. But how we understand justice and mercy will depend on how we understand our place in the world.
And for that, we need to start in Gen 1.
[+] So God created man in His own image; He created him in the image of God; He created them male and female. God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every creature that crawls on the earth.” (Gen 1:27-28)
Historically, this command is known as the Creation Mandate, and was Adam’s first command. By extension, it applies to all humans everywhere. When it was repeated to Noah after the flood in Gen 9, it came with a special addition: man was commanded to execute all murderers because humans are created in the image of God, therefore man is supposed to execute all murderers (Gen 9:5-6) . This command is binding on all humans everywhere (if you have rainbows in your country, then the “everlasting” Noahic Covenant applies in your country. Gen 9:16). In ancient days, the patriarch or tribal chieftain was entrusted to mete out justice within and against his clan. That duty was eventually transferred to magistrates of cities/countries. Today, we entrust that duty to the government (Rom 13).
But let me repeat: although Christians are also tasked with the Great Commission (Matt 28), the Creation Mandate was never suspended or terminated anywhere in human history.
It is still in effect today.
What does that have to do with the price of immigration in Canaan?
So glad you asked.
All immigrants fall into 3 basic categories:
- A – Those looking for easier work/living conditions
- B – Those looking for easier handouts/benefits
- C – Those looking for easier victims
The Bible is univocal in its condemnation of participating in the latter 2 categories. Especially if the immigrants have to break laws to do so. Titus 1, 2 Thess 3, and Proverbs describes these people as lazy, fools, gluttons, and liars (God’s words, not mine). If those terms apply to citizens, why would that not also apply to immigrants who are breaking laws in their quest for easy handouts and easy victims? The Bible does not condone giving aid to CategoryB and CategoryC citizens, and by natural extension, does not condone giving aid to immigrants (legal or illegal) in CategoryB or CategoryC (Unfortunately, in this Dispensation of Tolerance, the Church has lost its ability to speak to this condition using the same language the Bible uses. Another discussion for another day.)
For the CategoryA immigrants, legal or illegal, there are 2 basic motivators, and they should not be confused:
- “If I go there, life will be better”
- “If I stay here, I will suffer and die”
The two motivators overlap, but they are not the same.
We can debate whether or not a country is obligated to help people in Category1. Some of them can help themselves and don’t need others to help them. (1 Tim 5:8; 11; 16)
But what’s not up for debate is that all humans everywhere have a moral obligation to help people who can’t help themselves and find themselves in Category2. This is necessarily implied in the Creation Mandate from Gen 1 and Gen 9. To state the obvious, you cannot have human flourishing by leaving people to be oppressed, suffer, and die at the hands of evil rulers. If something can be done, it should be.
Options & priorities
The Bible lays out several options for helping the oppressed, and we should apply them with an eye to Augustine’s Just War Theory. In oversimplified terms, they are as follows:
1. Break the fangs of the wicked (Job 29:16-17; Gen 14; Prov 30:14; Ps 124)
This is the first step to attempt when looking out for the oppressed. This is what Job did, and he defended it as righteous. This is what Abraham did when his nephew was kidnapped (Abe killed the 4 kings of the East and kept all their plunder [except for the portion that belonged to Bera, king of Sodom], and gave 1/10th of his spoils of war to Melchizedek, and split the rest with his buddies, Eschol, Aner, and Mamre.)
Modern Christians often balk at the idea of killing evil lords, but this option is perfectly consistent with Gen 9, where we are commanded to execute murderers [granted, through the govt. See Rom 13]. This option brings the most amount of peace to the largest number of oppressed people. The oppressed get to stay in their lands, keep their foods, their culture, their language, their climate, and their possessions. (Experienced travelers know that this list is not trivial. Changing foods, culture, language, and climate can be just as traumatizing as losing all your possessions.)
Breaking the fangs of the wicked is textbook Justice, and is consistent with the Bible.
2. If #1 can’t be done (See Augustine’s Just War Theory), then relocate as many oppressed as possible to safe zones near the homeland of the oppressed.
This is what Edom failed to do in Obadiah 1 when Jerusalem was under attack.
This option is inferior to #1 because it brings the 2nd most amount of peace to the oppressed; it leaves many people oppressed.
Instead of staying in their lands, the rescued people stay near their lands (and move back when peace comes). Their evil oppressor stays in power, but due to their geographical proximity, the oppressed who are able to evacuate get to keep their culture, their language, their climate, and hopefully a bunch of their possessions.
3. If #2 can’t be done, then the third best option is to relocate as many oppressed people as possible to safe zones far away from their homelands.
Due to logistics, this option helps the fewest number of people, leaving behind the majority of people to be oppressed. The oppressed foreigners en masse cannot afford the travel, and have to rely on the benevolence of others to travel far distances.
They lose their lands, their possessions (often keeping only the clothes they can carry), their language, their climate, their foods, etc. But it’s better than dying.
That is textbook Mercy.
Modern thinking vs Biblical thinking
* When a modern Christian says we need to “do justice and mercy to the sojourner”, I wonder if they understand the complete picture painted in the Bible. Are they’re willing to be like Abraham and Job and Jesus (Ps 3; Ps 110) and call for breaking the fangs of the wicked so that peace can come to all the citizens of that country? If that’s not part of their response – indeed, if it’s not their first response – I have to wonder if they’re aware of all that the Bible has to say on the topic. After all, Option#1 ought to be our first call.
I’ve lost count of the number of times I heard people trying to score virtue signaling points for giving 10,000 Afghans a 1-way ticket to the USA while ignoring 100,000,000 Afghans left behind to suffer under the Taliban. With all due respect, rejoicing over the one and ignoring the 99 to suffer oppression is itself evil!
Breaking the fangs of the wicked is consistent with the Creation Mandate, and does not contradict the Great Commission. (Consider the context of Acts 13:9-12)
A second point under ‘break the fangs of the wicked’ (and one that we’re not allowed to mention in this Dispensation of Tolerance) is the correction of dysfunctional cultures. If a culture drives its own people into the ground (which many third-world cultures do), Christians ought to be the first to call them out and challenge them to improve/correct their cultural pathologies. That’s not “Christian Nationalism” or “Cultural Imperialism”. It’s Biblical thinking, straight from Matt 28. In Jesus’ own words, discipleship is “teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you”. The Bible does not condone silence in the face of evil, whether that evil is a president, king, or the culture itself.
* Modern international Law requires that people fleeing oppression are to seek refuge in the first free country they arrive at. Since most oppressed citizens are incapable of holding their oppressors accountable, and are powerless to break the fangs of their oppressors, then fleeing to nearby safe zones is consistent with Biblical thought and Option#2. But in the case of immigrants flooding the USA’s southern border, they are *all* ignoring this mandate, and refusing to seek refuge in the first free country they arrive at. Maybe it’s because the countries themselves refuse to grant them refuge (eg, despite sharing a border with Gaza, Egypt has a wall 7 barriers thick [Trump would be jealous], and refuses to grant asylum to fleeing Palestinians. Jordan also shares a border with the West Bank and refuses to grant asylum to Palestinians). But even when given the chance, the supermajority of these illegal immigrants are skipping the first free country and making a beeline for the USA – not just to escape oppression and return to their home country when peace returns, but to get better welfare benefits, handouts — and in the case of hardened criminals, to find better victims. In this scenario, it seems plain to me that the broader scope of “help the widow, orphan, and sojourner” does not apply to people who rush past safe zones in order to get better welfare handouts. Their help ought to be in those safe zones, not some faraway country, where distance will forcibly disconnect them from the land God gave them. [Disclaimer: in this article, I am only talking about emergency immigration and illegal immigration, where oppressed immigrants circumvent established law. I am not against legal immigration. Legal immigrants moving on their own steam using their own resources should be free to travel far and wide, to the liking of their preferences and the hospitality of their host country. My mother is an immigrant, and my parents do not share the same national citizenship. This kind of legal immigration that comes through the front door at the welcome of the host country is a different subject]
Practical applications
* After having exhausted the above 2 points, what should we do when immigrants (legal or illegal) show up at our front door?
[Much of the following will be drawn from my daughters’ experiences working with UN Refugees with World Relief and Catholic Charities. Your opinion and mileage may vary]
– Examine yourself first (Matt 7:1-6). If you’re the sort of person who won’t let a stranger help themselves to your home or car or closet or pantry, then don’t demand other people or nations do what you yourself won’t do. Be morally consistent. And note that all the NT instructions on feeding/clothing the poor are aimed at individuals, not governments. If you’re not personally helping PeopleX, you have no moral basis to demand other people or governments help those you’re not personally helping. Also, bear in mind that the Church has a Biblical mandate to take care of church members first before tending to the unchurched (Gal 6:10). And it’s not just churches, but nations have an obligation to take care of citizens first before taking care of non-citizens (Matt 17:24-27).
– Meet their pain, not their luxuries, and don’t confuse the two.
If they’re starving, give them food and water. If they brought the starvation on themselves, show them how to not do that in this culture (and if they keep doing it, rebuke them! Titus 1:10-14)
Their cultural presuppositions do not apply in the USA, and some immigrants need lots of help navigating those changes. So if they kill ducks in your park for food, don’t condemn them (and yes, it happens! My daughter told me about issues like this for their UN refugees long before Trump came along). Do not make a policy of giving out free luxuries. It only ruins them. Read “When Helping Hurts”.
Brief aside: Because of our ministry in Africa, I have several Nigerians that I work with indirectly, who emigrated to the USA. They cannot get it through their heads that living on welfare checks is actually trap, hurting them in the long run. They keep thinking that the US gov’t is doing them wrong by giving them so little money, and that they’ll finally ‘make it’ once the gov’t wises up and gives them larger checks. So they plod along on gov’t assistance, talking about how they’re suffering because the gov’t is unjust. I cannot get them to see that all the ‘rich people’ they envy do not accept any gov’t money: they work for their money. But because socialistic presuppositions are baked into their cultural worldview, they cannot get past the idea that they themselves are solely responsible for their lot in life. They keep thinking “we’re all in this together, and our chief [the gov’t] must give us more.” They need to come to grips with what Prov 30:15 looks like in the USA.
– Be prepared to show them that life in the USA is wholly unlike what they saw on TV. In the case of UN refugees, they actually do go through 7 Stages of Grief (including depression) when they come to realize that life in the USA is much harder than they were led to believe. Many are stunned that you have to work 40+hours a week just to survive. Many do not understand that you can get evicted for not paying rent and that it ruins your credit score. Many don’t even know what a credit score is or why anyone would want one.
(My daughter had a number of Iraqi refugees on her case load who wanted to go back to Iraq where they had status and careers, but had to settle for jobs as custodians because their degrees weren’t worth the paper they were printed on)
– Do not fall for the nonsense that all immigrants are alike. Cultures are different, and those differences are tangible; they shape people in ways that Americans are usually totally unaccustomed to. Congolese immigrants, for example, are notorious for being lazy trouble-making thieves. Afghans are well known for being kind, gracious and hard-working, and will shower you with food. Burmese are known for being clanish and untrusting. Cretans are known for being gluttons and lazy liars ..oh wait. That was Paul 2,000 years ago (Titus 1:12-13). Maybe Cretans have changed since then.
My point is this: of course individuals are exceptions, but cultures do matter, and cultures are not created equally. So don’t treat them equally.
– If you have the stomach for it, watch Trevor Phillips’ documentary “Things We Won’t Say About Race That Are True”. It got pulled off YouTube, but you can find it here. https://www.bitchute.com/video/4bIDNGXiq1xr/
At any rate, some personal issues you will run into, pro and con, are baked into the culture. Tread carefully or you’ll get burned or burned out.
[A brief aside… One of my daughters worked for Catholic Charities. The burnout rate in her CC office was usually 9 months before do-gooders wanted to move into management because the immigrants in their caseload drove them to drink. Whereas the burnout rate for World Relief was much lower. Largely because WR case workers were Christians and they were working with a completely different ethic. More could be said about that.]
– Definitely read “When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor and Yourself”. Much awfulness and harm is done in the name of goodwill baked with naiveté.
– Consider being like Paul to Onesimus, the runaway slave: when they’re on their feet, send them back home. (That’s another thing that’s 100% Biblical, but we’re not allowed to say in this Dispensation of Tolerance). BTW, in my firm opinion, if you can’t see why it was necessary for Paul to send Onesimus back to his master, you are very likely not qualified to weigh in on what the Bible teaches about justice, mercy, slavery, or immigration. After all, Paul should have set Onesimus free, right? (See Deut 23:15-16 and try lining that up with Paul’s behavior. If you can’t, let’s just say that you don’t see the Bible like Paul does. And that would be a problem.)
All of this to say, yes, this article is part of a much larger discussion on border, boundaries and who gets to decide who cross what borders.
Ain’t life grand?
{these thoughts are not new to me in light of the Trump 2.0 administration. I’ve held them for a number of years}
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