BORDERS AND BOUNDARIES

Each day a caravan of hopeful immigrants crosses several borders as they walk up from Central America and move through Mexico toward the United States. They are fleeing violence and poverty and hoping to build a better life for their families. Only desperate people risk such a dangerous journey.

The closer they get, the louder the shouting on this side of the border.  One side wants you to believe outsiders are a threat, either sneaking in to kill you or coming to suck dry all your social services. The other side is trying to convince you that the president is a heartless, racist xenophobe who wants to be a totalitarian dictator. BOTH sides are using fear to to further their agenda. Please don’t fall for it. Ask yourself, who or what is served by fear? 

We know better

Simplistic answers that fit on bumper stickers rarely make good policy. “Build the wall.” “Open the border”. Are those really the only options? Of course not. Reasonable people on both sides know that. The kind of people who build walls to keep everyone out are paranoid recluses. Those who have no boundaries at all get overrun by opportunists with needs.

Home and Country

The same principles apply to a country as to your home. You have walls on your home because you value what’s inside. Your family feels secure and has safe places to keep their belongings. A house with only walls and no doors would be a prison. We need doors so people can come in and go out. But you get to choose who is allowed in your house and how long they stay. Alternatively, a house with the doors removed would not feel very secure and you may have some homeless people moving in uninvited. 

We need secure borders (with doors of entry) AND we need to find ways of helping the poor and asylum seeking refugees of the world. We need to help the homeless AND we need to provide secure homes for our families too. On a personal level as well as on a national level, we make these decisions about boundaries and borders every day.  If we don’t make them for ourselves, someone else will make them for us. It may not be easy, but it is important. 

So let’s talk about our own personal boundaries first on Sunday. Then, if you would like to lean in with love instead of fear, you can join us to go cross the border.  Meet some of these immigrants in the caravan firsthand, hear their stories, and try to help share God’s love in some small ways.  Join us on Saturday, November 17th. Email Stephen Allison for more info.