Seeking Refuge

It's too bad that one of the inheritances of Protestantism is that we think the Torah is irrelevant because it's called "Law." Jesus says explicitly, "I have not come to abolish the Law, but to fulfill it" (Mt. 5:17). At his Ascension, which we celebrate this week, he tells us he is the one spoken of in the Law and Prophets.

So if we want to learn about Jesus, we can read about him in the Old Testament. And if we read the Old Testament, we come across some version of the following verse many, many times:

You shall not wrong or oppress a resident alien, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt. (Exodus 22:21)

The Torah has a lot of rules and regulations. The rationale for many of them goes like this: you were once in trouble, so don't be horrible to other people who are in trouble.

This is especially true of strangers, "aliens." Today we call them refugees, asylum-seekers, immigrants.

Why do immigrants come here? Depends on who you ask. There is not one reason. But every foreigner has one thing in common: they are foreign, not from here, a stranger. And this is what the Bible cares about. Not the "why" but the "who."

The "who" matters because God's own people are always fundamentally foreign. Even after many generations in the land, Israel retold the story again and again of being delivered out of the land of Egypt. There they had to chew bread while the Egyptians enjoyed meat. There they had to make bricks without straw. There they were enslaved. And could never forget.

It seems as though one of the ways of not forgetting was by treating other foreigners with the same compassion and generosity God showed them.

It's true of us too. Our lives are relatively comfortable. It's easy to forget that while we're out of Egypt/out of the reign of death and captivity, this country, this life, is not all there is. We're still on the way. We're still sojourning, on our pilgrimage. Home awaits.

So while there are many reasons to care for the asylum-seeker at the door -- compassion, receiving their gifts -- this is surely one of the most important: remembering that we took seek refuge under the shadow of His wings.

Pastor Eddy