“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
- Excerpt from The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus
(This poem in its entirety is engraved at the base of the Statue of Liberty.)
Rumors swirled through the streets. Idle gossip slithered through the market stalls. Who were these wealthy foreigners who had appeared, after traveling for weeks, and bestowed the most expensive gifts on a certain child? Did these strangers also bear warnings to his parents that their son’s life was in danger? Perhaps these new parents worried for their son’s safety as they wondered what to do. But God had a plan. Through a dream, He directed their path.
The start of the liturgical season of Epiphany marks the time when the Magi, sometimes referred to as the Three Kings, travel a great distance to follow a bright star in the heavens. When this celestial light stops over a stable housing a poor couple and their swaddled infant, the Magi worship the Christ Child and lavish Him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh (Matthew 2:1-12). Do they suspect King Herod’s nefarious plan to kill Jesus? Perhaps they warn the new parents. Perhaps Joseph isn’t convinced of the danger or is unsure of a plan, until through a dream, God instructs him and his family to flee (Matthew 2:13-18*).
Leaving in the middle of the night, Joseph and Mary escape with the Infant Jesus to cross the border at Egypt. How tired they must have been from traveling so far. How hungry they must have been. How traumatized they must have been from having to flee for their very lives.
The Bible doesn’t speak to the Holy Family’s time in Egypt. But we do know that they were foreigners in a foreign land. Immigrants. Refugees. Did Mary and Joseph speak Egyptian? It’s doubtful. They had to navigate a new country with its different language, customs, laws, and even different food. Nothing was familiar to them. They had to find a new home, not knowing how long they would be staying. They arrived at the border with no sponsor, no connections, and no place to live. What if they weren’t even safe there? What if Herod’s reach extended into Egypt?
Yes, God had told them to flee to Egypt. Through the Magi, He also provided rich gifts that perhaps were used to buy food and housing or used to barter for clothing and furniture. Or maybe those gifts provided a place for Joseph to set up a carpentry shop to create his craft in his newly adopted country.
I can’t help but think of the parallels today of people who are compelled to leave violent or horrendous living conditions in search of a safer and better life for themselves and their children. Like Joseph and Mary, they travel long distances, often on foot, to reach the southern US border.
Their plight differs from that of the Holy Family. Instead of living quiet lives in their new home country, they encounter hostility. Many are forced to turn around and return to the violence they thought they left behind. Some are forced to wait in unsafe places in Mexico. And some are misled to board buses to the north, arriving on a frigid Christmas Eve without food or blankets at the official residence of the US Vice President. (This actually happened when Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) sent 3 busloads of immigrants this past Christmas to Washington, DC, without food, warm clothes, or blankets and abandoned them at the official VP residence.) Others, deceived by lies of promised jobs in Martha’s Vineyard, were flown in private planes to Massachusetts by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R). New York City and Chicago are also frequent destinations of this type of forced travel from border states. Like pawns in a political chess game, these helpless immigrants in search of a better life are tossed around like unwanted trash.
Yet in God’s eyes, they are valuable. They are created in His image.
In Matthew 25:35, Jesus says, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger [foreigner] and you invited me in.” Jesus says that whatever you do for the least of these, you do for Him. The consequences of not doing for the least of these is eternal punishment, the antithesis of eternal life (Matthew 25:45-46**).
In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus calls all people from all nations. He judges individual actions, but He also judges nations. How will the US be judged by God for its mistreatment of refugees at the southern border? I shudder to think how we’ve missed the mark.
For our lack of compassion, we will be judged.
From a practical standpoint, refusing entry to hundreds of thousands of immigrants will have dire consequences and not just for the immigrants themselves. With Baby Boomers retiring, the current labor shortage will only worsen, but it can be mitigated with the influx of refugees. Perhaps hard-working people from other countries can help fill this gap, and in the process, help fulfill their own dreams of living in a safer country and being able to provide for their children.
Before the Holy Family’s flight, the Hebrew people had been slaves in Egypt. After God, through Moses, rescued them, He tells them in Deuteronomy 10:18-19, that “He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.”
What if you found yourself in a situation where you had to flee your home country? Would you want to be treated as if you were cattle? Would you want to be kept in cages or forced to be bused or flown to an unknown part of a foreign country with no resources? The Bible’s Golden Rule*** tells us how to respond to the refugees at our border. Will we obey it?
Jesus was a refugee in Egypt. Perhaps if we saw Jesus in each of the children and adults arriving at our border, we’d seek better and quicker solutions to the situation. We’d write to our representatives in Congress to implore them to seek humane treatment for those arriving destitute, traumatized, and afraid. We’d vote for politicians who see these immigrants as people created in God’s image and who promise to help them (and who work to fulfill those promises). Perhaps we’d support organizations that work to help immigrants, from the legal aspects of seeking asylum to helping them find housing and employment. In doing so, maybe we’d be placed on Jesus’ right, with the “sheep”, who Jesus rewards with eternal life in heaven. If only we truly did for the least of these.
Heavenly Father, may I see refugees and immigrants as people created in Your image. May I extend the compassion of Christ in practical ways, not only to help them one-on-one, but also to work to undo the chains of oppression and the systems of repression that seek to do them harm. May I treat immigrants and refugees as I would want to be treated, with compassion, kindness, and love. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
NOTE: There are many immigration lawyers who work, often for free or on fellowships, to help immigrants and refugees at the border. These organizations, like Immigrant Justice Corps (https://justicecorps.org/), need your support to do all the work they need to do. Other organizations, like Lutheran Immigration and Resettlement Services (www.lirs.org), seek to resettle refugees and immigrants into the community, helping them find a new home, paying the rental deposit and several months’ rent, and also helping them find employment, if they can actually legally obtain work. For more info on organizations serving immigrants and refugees, check out Charity Navigators at https://www.charitynavigator.org/search?q=immigration.
Immigration laws in the US are in need of reform. Read up on this issue to learn more and to learn how you can help. See https://www.immigrationadvocates.org/news/ to get started. Write to your representatives in Congress to put this issue in the forefront. Check local organizations where you live to see who is actively helping to resettle refugees and see how you can help.
*Matthew 2:13-15: When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
**Matthew 25:45-46: “He (Jesus) will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
***The Golden Rule - Matthew 7:12 – [Jesus says,] “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”
Text and photograph copyright © 2023 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of the replica of the Statue of Liberty, Jardin du Luxembourg, Paris, France.
Do you know the story behind the Statue of Liberty? Click here to see photos and to learn more.
February is Black History month. Click here to learn more.
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe.
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.
Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).
Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice. Click here to learn more.
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”
- Excerpt from The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus
(This poem in its entirety is engraved at the base of the Statue of Liberty.)
Rumors swirled through the streets. Idle gossip slithered through the market stalls. Who were these wealthy foreigners who had appeared, after traveling for weeks, and bestowed the most expensive gifts on a certain child? Did these strangers also bear warnings to his parents that their son’s life was in danger? Perhaps these new parents worried for their son’s safety as they wondered what to do. But God had a plan. Through a dream, He directed their path.
The start of the liturgical season of Epiphany marks the time when the Magi, sometimes referred to as the Three Kings, travel a great distance to follow a bright star in the heavens. When this celestial light stops over a stable housing a poor couple and their swaddled infant, the Magi worship the Christ Child and lavish Him with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh (Matthew 2:1-12). Do they suspect King Herod’s nefarious plan to kill Jesus? Perhaps they warn the new parents. Perhaps Joseph isn’t convinced of the danger or is unsure of a plan, until through a dream, God instructs him and his family to flee (Matthew 2:13-18*).
Leaving in the middle of the night, Joseph and Mary escape with the Infant Jesus to cross the border at Egypt. How tired they must have been from traveling so far. How hungry they must have been. How traumatized they must have been from having to flee for their very lives.
The Bible doesn’t speak to the Holy Family’s time in Egypt. But we do know that they were foreigners in a foreign land. Immigrants. Refugees. Did Mary and Joseph speak Egyptian? It’s doubtful. They had to navigate a new country with its different language, customs, laws, and even different food. Nothing was familiar to them. They had to find a new home, not knowing how long they would be staying. They arrived at the border with no sponsor, no connections, and no place to live. What if they weren’t even safe there? What if Herod’s reach extended into Egypt?
Yes, God had told them to flee to Egypt. Through the Magi, He also provided rich gifts that perhaps were used to buy food and housing or used to barter for clothing and furniture. Or maybe those gifts provided a place for Joseph to set up a carpentry shop to create his craft in his newly adopted country.
I can’t help but think of the parallels today of people who are compelled to leave violent or horrendous living conditions in search of a safer and better life for themselves and their children. Like Joseph and Mary, they travel long distances, often on foot, to reach the southern US border.
Their plight differs from that of the Holy Family. Instead of living quiet lives in their new home country, they encounter hostility. Many are forced to turn around and return to the violence they thought they left behind. Some are forced to wait in unsafe places in Mexico. And some are misled to board buses to the north, arriving on a frigid Christmas Eve without food or blankets at the official residence of the US Vice President. (This actually happened when Texas Governor Greg Abbott (R) sent 3 busloads of immigrants this past Christmas to Washington, DC, without food, warm clothes, or blankets and abandoned them at the official VP residence.) Others, deceived by lies of promised jobs in Martha’s Vineyard, were flown in private planes to Massachusetts by Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R). New York City and Chicago are also frequent destinations of this type of forced travel from border states. Like pawns in a political chess game, these helpless immigrants in search of a better life are tossed around like unwanted trash.
Yet in God’s eyes, they are valuable. They are created in His image.
In Matthew 25:35, Jesus says, “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger [foreigner] and you invited me in.” Jesus says that whatever you do for the least of these, you do for Him. The consequences of not doing for the least of these is eternal punishment, the antithesis of eternal life (Matthew 25:45-46**).
In Matthew 25:31-46, Jesus calls all people from all nations. He judges individual actions, but He also judges nations. How will the US be judged by God for its mistreatment of refugees at the southern border? I shudder to think how we’ve missed the mark.
For our lack of compassion, we will be judged.
From a practical standpoint, refusing entry to hundreds of thousands of immigrants will have dire consequences and not just for the immigrants themselves. With Baby Boomers retiring, the current labor shortage will only worsen, but it can be mitigated with the influx of refugees. Perhaps hard-working people from other countries can help fill this gap, and in the process, help fulfill their own dreams of living in a safer country and being able to provide for their children.
Before the Holy Family’s flight, the Hebrew people had been slaves in Egypt. After God, through Moses, rescued them, He tells them in Deuteronomy 10:18-19, that “He defends the cause of the fatherless and the widow, and loves the foreigner residing among you, giving them food and clothing. And you are to love those who are foreigners, for you yourselves were foreigners in Egypt.”
What if you found yourself in a situation where you had to flee your home country? Would you want to be treated as if you were cattle? Would you want to be kept in cages or forced to be bused or flown to an unknown part of a foreign country with no resources? The Bible’s Golden Rule*** tells us how to respond to the refugees at our border. Will we obey it?
Jesus was a refugee in Egypt. Perhaps if we saw Jesus in each of the children and adults arriving at our border, we’d seek better and quicker solutions to the situation. We’d write to our representatives in Congress to implore them to seek humane treatment for those arriving destitute, traumatized, and afraid. We’d vote for politicians who see these immigrants as people created in God’s image and who promise to help them (and who work to fulfill those promises). Perhaps we’d support organizations that work to help immigrants, from the legal aspects of seeking asylum to helping them find housing and employment. In doing so, maybe we’d be placed on Jesus’ right, with the “sheep”, who Jesus rewards with eternal life in heaven. If only we truly did for the least of these.
Heavenly Father, may I see refugees and immigrants as people created in Your image. May I extend the compassion of Christ in practical ways, not only to help them one-on-one, but also to work to undo the chains of oppression and the systems of repression that seek to do them harm. May I treat immigrants and refugees as I would want to be treated, with compassion, kindness, and love. In Jesus’ Name, Amen.
NOTE: There are many immigration lawyers who work, often for free or on fellowships, to help immigrants and refugees at the border. These organizations, like Immigrant Justice Corps (https://justicecorps.org/), need your support to do all the work they need to do. Other organizations, like Lutheran Immigration and Resettlement Services (www.lirs.org), seek to resettle refugees and immigrants into the community, helping them find a new home, paying the rental deposit and several months’ rent, and also helping them find employment, if they can actually legally obtain work. For more info on organizations serving immigrants and refugees, check out Charity Navigators at https://www.charitynavigator.org/search?q=immigration.
Immigration laws in the US are in need of reform. Read up on this issue to learn more and to learn how you can help. See https://www.immigrationadvocates.org/news/ to get started. Write to your representatives in Congress to put this issue in the forefront. Check local organizations where you live to see who is actively helping to resettle refugees and see how you can help.
*Matthew 2:13-15: When they had gone, an angel of the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream. “Get up,” he said, “take the child and his mother and escape to Egypt. Stay there until I tell you, for Herod is going to search for the child to kill him.” So he got up, took the child and his mother during the night and left for Egypt, where he stayed until the death of Herod. And so was fulfilled what the Lord had said through the prophet: “Out of Egypt I called my son.”
**Matthew 25:45-46: “He (Jesus) will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’ “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
***The Golden Rule - Matthew 7:12 – [Jesus says,] “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets.”
Text and photograph copyright © 2023 by Dawn Dailey. All rights reserved. Photo of the replica of the Statue of Liberty, Jardin du Luxembourg, Paris, France.
Do you know the story behind the Statue of Liberty? Click here to see photos and to learn more.
February is Black History month. Click here to learn more.
Not a subscriber to the monthly blog posts? Click here to subscribe.
A NOTE ON SOCIAL JUSTICE:
Jesus says the greatest commandments are to love God and to love people (Matthew 22:37-40). The Christian faith boils down to these two precepts.
Social justice puts that love into action by helping individuals who are oppressed, mistreated, or suffering, and by pursuing ways to dismantle systems of oppression. How we treat others, particularly those less powerful in society than ourselves, matters (Matthew 25:31-46).
Racial justice is one aspect of social justice. Check out my web page on “Justice Matters” to find resources and to connect with organizations engaging in the cause of racial justice. Click here to learn more.
All scripture quotations, unless otherwise indicated, are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®. Copyright ©1973, 1978, 1984, 2011 by Biblica, Inc.™ Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide. www.zondervan.com The “NIV” and “New International Version” are trademarks registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office by Biblica, Inc.™
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