After speaking to a Sunday school class about immigration, a woman asked if she could talk to me. She pulled me aside and whispered, “I think there’s a girl in my daughter’s class this year who is, umm, not legal. What should I do?”
She explained that her daughter had befriended a new girl. When they talked, the student was evasive and said she wasn’t allowed to say where she lived for fear someone would take her mother away and send her back to Mexico. The woman asked me, “What should I do? Do I need to turn her in?”
I assured the woman that she had no reason to report the girl or her mother and suggested she encourage her daughter to invite the girl over instead. “But couldn’t we get into trouble if she’s not here legally?” the woman asked.
I often hear these kinds of concerns when I speak about immigration. Fear of being on the wrong side of the law creates confusion about how to respond to immigrants, especially those who may not be in the U.S. legally. Plenty of parents find themselves in similar positions as the woman I spoke with—unsure how to relate to new students or their families when their immigration status is unclear. Read more
For Americans immigration has become a hot button issue. For Christians three passages of Scripture provide us with guidance. The first is Deuteronomy 10:19, "Love the sojourner (or foreigner or stranger), therefore, for you were sojourners (or foreigners or strangers) in the land of Egypt." The second is Matthew 25:35, "For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me (or took me in)." The third passage, 1 Peter 2:11, reminds us that all believers are "strangers and temporary residents" in this world.
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