Seven years ago I went on a mission to Kenya. We worked hand-in-hand with the local Habitat for Humanity to build homes, stone homes with no electricity and no running water, but a home with four walls and a roof, not a temporary humanitarian response tent used for the last three years when it was only designed for at most six months of use. And we were in Kenya, building these homes, for IDPs, that is Internally Displaced Persons, in other words, refugees, but still in their own country, forced to flee their ancestral lands due to political and tribal violence that nearly descended into outright civil war. 98 percent of these IDPs, these human beings, were women and children (many of whom were not even the children of the women who watched over them), with the only men being those who were too old to put up resistance during the fighting and were forced to flee. The men, the fathers and husbands, of these people were dead.
Their stories were stories of terror, of fear, of violence, of death, stories that none of us have ever had to live through, stories that none of us will hopefully ever have to live through, stories that no human being should have to live through. But one surprising thread through all of their stories, a theme that should not have been surprising in retrospect, but still a surprise to this sheltered, privileged, white male from America, was their unwavering faith that God would carry them through their moments of trial. As they wandered on foot for days, leaving the only land their family had ever known for centuries if not millennia, hiding from those who wished to do them harm, they had faith that God would carry them through, that they would find safe harbor, that life would resume in some shape or fashion. That one day a bunch of well-meaning white people from Kansas would come into their lives for a week and help build a couple of homes for them.
I can’t help but think of the stories I heard during my time in Kenya when I see the atrocities our government is carrying out against refugees and asylum seekers. I can’t help but think of the stories I heard during my time in Kenya, because I have to have faith that God will carry the asylum seekers and refugees through this moment in time, I have to have faith that God will carry those who would stand up against these injustices only to meet walls of bureaucracy and false narratives, I have to have faith that God will move the hearts of those intent on committing evil, move the hearts of those who are convinced that this evil is morally just and right because of a misguided sense that justice must be carried out, excepting the fact that this is clearly not God’s justice, justice which is based on love, on forgiveness, on helping our neighbor in whatever way we can. I can’t help but think of the stories I heard during my time in Kenya when I see the news today, and when I read the Gospel today.
Why are we afraid? Do we have no faith that God will provide peace?
Distorting God because of fear is a privilege of the powerful, used to further stoke fears rather than bring peace. How else can you explain the Bible being used to justify policies that are explicitly designed to create chaos and harm? If the Bible is used to justify, then the policy must be just. It leads us to think that families legally crossing the border seeking asylum are the waves and wind battering against the boat of America, threatening to swamp us over.
Except, it is these policies and those who implemented them that are the storm, are the waves crashing around the boat and battering it. Think about it, the wind that is threatening to divide our boat, to drive us into chaos and despair, cannot be those human beings, our neighbors, who are coming to us seeking help. No, the wind that batters us is the evil that has been allowed to act with impunity in ways that are immoral, unjust, and just plain wrong.
This is a moment in the life of our society where the name of Jesus must be invoked to rebuke the storm. To stand up and say that beyond all of the ills in our society, acknowledging that pain and harm and family separation of a sort happens to “our people”, that is citizens, when they commit crimes, that this practice happening at our borders goes beyond any practice that is otherwise practiced in the American Judicial system. That this practice happening at our borders, of separating families and now having no plans on how or when to reunite them, of having “tender care” facilities specifically designed for infants, of jailing entire families, is being done to those who are turning themselves in, legally seeking asylum, legally asking the government to hear their stories of unchecked violence, of outright fear, of knowing what will happen when they cross the border into America and being willing to do it anyways because even the pain, torture, and lack of humanity that we are showing towards them is still better than what they were facing at home.
We are allowing ourselves to become the storm, to become the wind that is blowing hard, to become the sea trying to swamp the boats of refugees to watch them drown. We need to be rebuked by Christ. We need to hear his words today, “Peace! Be still!,” and in this we must respond with Christ to stand up and rebuke the wind that persists.
In waking up Christ, the disciples asked this question, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” Do you not care that we are perishing? Do you not care that your neighbor is perishing? Do you not care that innocent children are perishing? Do you not care?