A Colossal Mistake

Weeks like the one that just passed do little to advance for the kingdom of Christ. I have read so many posts supporting and rejecting allowing Syrian refugees into our country for safe haven. I have seen the bickering on Facebook by Christians on both sides of the argument. Some of what I've read shows the love of Christ and a recognition of where we would be without his love, but others fall short of expressing an understanding of what it means to be in Christ. Safety should not be our utmost concern, yet fear of what might happen seems to be the prevailing factor in many of the posts I've seen. Proverbs 29:25 expresses this wisdom: "The fear of man lays a snare, but whoever trusts in the Lord is safe." Regardless of what happens to me in this life, God is in ultimately in control. The apostle Paul speaks to this in II Corinthians 5:1-8:

“For we know that if our earthly house, this tent, is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this we groan, earnestly desiring to be clothed with our habitation which is from heaven, if indeed, having been clothed, we shall not be found naked. For we who are in this tent groan, being burdened, not because we want to be unclothed, but further clothed, that mortality may be swallowed up by life. Now He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who also has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always confident, knowing that while we are at home in the body we are absent from the Lord. For we walk by faith, not by sight. We are confident, yes, well pleased rather to be absent from the body and to be present with the Lord” (ESV).

I mentioned the verse from Proverbs because it seems that fear has a way of setting a snare for Americans--at least that is the history that has already been proven. I remember studying history back in the dark ages of high school and wondering how Americans could be so closed to allowing refugees to enter the United States. The plight of the Jews fleeing the Hitler regime in the 1930s (German Jews, including thousands of Jewish children, and other Jewish refugees from European countries) was one the U.S. refused to embrace. Fear outweighed the rationality behind the rejection of so many that would go on to die under Hitler's regime. They, like us today, had forgotten that the "melting pot" symbolized America's willingness to grant freedom and life to those sheltered within its borders. I am afraid that the melting pot is no more. We are now a selfish, multicultural nation that once again is rejecting the basic tenets of what it means to be American. Did all Americans not learn as I did about the gift of the Statue of Liberty to the U.S. by the French honoring the perseverance of freedom and democracy that followed the Revolutionary War? The inscription found on the pedestal comes from a sonnet titled "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus, written in 1883:

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.

"Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she
With silent lips. "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!"

When the excerpt from the poem was added to its base, the statue became a symbol for oppressed masses--for hope that there is a better life in a land that would accept a refugee and shelter him/her. Unfortunately, when I read this today, I think we are much more like the old Colossus than the one Lazarus wrote of in her poem. The first statue was built to thank the Greek gods for victory over an invading enemy. I am afraid this turning away of refugees, which some see as a "victory" is just another marker in the march of the U.S. away from God. What we really need is to be raised from the death of a life spent in search of comfort and material safety.