• In this cultural moment, it’s all but impossible to speak of refugees, Syrian or otherwise, apart from politics. But we have to try. I’m all for government, as Paul is in Romans 13, and I appreciate T.S. Eliot’s observation that what we want of government, as Christians, is continued freedom to worship God and live faithful to him. We should continue to vote, write, speak, and pray that such would continue. We have many channels through which to address elected leaders and we should use all of them. I urge political involvement, though not the transfer of faith to politicians, which has always been a temptation and so the exhortation to “put not your trust in princes” (Ps 146:3). Vote and keep your trust in God. For some of you, this is not easily done.
• That said, the Church is ultimately governed by the law of God, and her conduct must reflect her self-awareness as Christ’s body on earth. As Christ, our mission in this brief sojourn will not be accomplished by self-concern and self-preservation, but by self-denial and self-sacrifice (Lk 9:23; Rom 12:1). Our intention is to lose our lives, not save them (Lk 9:24). We are those who (and this is now uncommon in America) love our enemies (Mt 5:43), and repay evil with good (Rom 12:14-21). If it costs you literally everything you have to be faithful to the ethics of the Kingdom, so be it (Lk 14:25-33). After all, that passage in Luke is about counting the cost before we commit to following Christ. The very expensive nature of following Jesus is part of his up-front full disclosure. This is what we signed up for. There are no cooks in this army; everyone’s in combat.
• More to the point regarding refugees, God is indiscriminately compassionate. I would cite a text for this, but it’s everywhere from Jonah (God saving Israel’s perennial enemy!) to the text I will preach Sunday in Mt 14. Even more specifically, beginning with the OT wisdom books, Judaism and Christianity have the strongest of ethics regarding care for the stranger and the outcast. “You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the LORD your God” (Lev 19:34). We all began as refugees, as Christians and as Americans, and we were given refuge. The Church of Jesus Christ, of all institutions and people, must offer compassion and refuge to those who seek it.
• Am I naive? Don’t I know that Jihadis will be among the refugees? Sure, I don’t doubt it for a second. But let me ask you a question: Do you think Jesus knew he would be killed by the very people to whom he came to offer love, mercy, and forgiveness? What if he had prayed, “Father, let this cup pass from me” and the Father had said, “You’re right, there’s too much risk and these people are idiots, let’s go”? Rather, in the face of certain risk, we say to the Father, “nevertheless, not my will but thine be done.”
• That’s the note, but I’m including below the story of an Iranian Muslim who became a Baptist minister. It’s out of the current issue of World Magazine and very much worth reading.
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Afshin Ziafat is the pastor of Providence Church in Frisco, Texas, but he was born into a devout Muslim family in Iran in 1972. His family fled during the violence of the Islamic revolution. The Iran hostage crisis began a few months after they arrived in the United States.
“I understand what it’s like to be from a place where people are suspicious of where you’re from,” Ziafat told the audience.
Ziafat said his family had car tires slashed, rocks thrown in the windows of their home, and BB guns shot at them. He and his brother were kicked off a soccer team when it was discovered they were from Iran.
But a Christian tutor saw an opportunity to spread the gospel, Ziafat said. She gave him a Bible in the second grade, and he eventually read it as a senior in high school—under a blanket with a flashlight so his parents wouldn’t know. He professed faith in Christ and later graduated from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary. Today, in addition to pastoring a church, Ziafat spends time going to Turkey to teach Iranian refugees how to evangelize and preach the gospel.
“I’m just thankful that one lady looked at our family and particularly looked at me and didn’t see a threat, but saw opportunity,” he said.
Ziafat urged Christians to keep a gospel-oriented point of view on the refugee crisis: “We applaud missionaries who have an eternal perspective and take risks, but then when the mission field is coming to us all the sudden we’re saying no, get out, we want protection. The goal of a Christian shouldn’t just be to preserve my life but to expend my life for the gospel.”