Our Place in God’s Work amidst refugee crisis

I trust you had visited www.nadchurchstudy.org and had made a contribution of your thought on changes needed in the Adventist church structure for the future,  as I invited you to do so in the past blogs J

The issue that is heating up in North America along side racial tension is our treatment of refugees.  Montreal will be receiving 6300 people from Syria in the next 12 months, Windsor will receive 1000 before the end of this year, London is scheduled to receive at least 400.  Churches and organizations had been fundraising to sponsor families into their communities.  How can we help?  Should we get involved?

A few years back when I taught the Mission 316 class, I shared a perspective that God had called his people to be missionaries and causes mission with or without our will.  When God’s people get too comfortable and reject strangers, God permits strangers to invade, or moves His people into exile among the strangers, so His Plan of Salvation would reach all nations.  His promise to bless all nations is irrevocable!  When Christian Empire refused to send missionaries to Barbarians, Goths, Vikings, God permitted their invasions into Christian empire, and in the process Christianity grew.  Consider current “invasion” of “strangers” into so-called “Christian” nations God’s allowance for our Christianity to be tested, to be manifested, to be exercised!

The Adventist Societyfor Religious Studies had issued a statement this week, outlining the theologyof how we must see the current situation:

In light of the present refugee crisis engulfing the globe, we as a body of religion scholars who are committed to the full gospel of Jesus Christ who said, “I was a stranger and you took me in” (Matt. 25:38); and who take seriously the Word of God in Deut. 23:9 that we must not oppress the strangers “because we were strangers in the land of Egypt” (cf. Lev. 19:34), the Adventist Society of Religious Studies asserts the following:

As sojourners and pilgrims ourselves, we recognize that we are all expatriates who have been called to manifest the principles of God’s eternal kingdom in all of our decisions.

As people with patriotic sympathies, we understand the power of the type of fear that saps human compassion, but we believe that we ought to always practice the perfect love that casts out all fear.

As creatures of national cultures, we acknowledge that we are comfortable with the familiar; however, our commitment to Christ compels us to reject xenophobia, outright racism and competitive religious extremism.

As members of the human family, we accept all men and women as our siblings, regardless of their religious confession or country of origin.

As followers of Christ, we will be the Good Samaritan to the victims of war; we will willingly clothe the naked, feed the hungry, care for the sick, visit the imprisoned and receive the refugee. We invite others to do the same.

 Consider what we can do as a community of faith.  Consider what you can do as an individual to be the hands, feet, Face of Jesus to the people in need.  Read Matthew 25:31-46 and consider where you stand!