Two weeks ago the U. S. Department of Labor Statistics reported total of 10.9 million job vacancies in the United States. Some of these demand high skill or extensive education. Some do not.
The hand-scribbled sign on the door of a restaurant read: “Closed for now. No workers”. National guard in several states have been deployed to drive buses because of a labor shortage. Hospitals are desperate for nurses.
At the same time, there are thousands—tens of thousands—of able-bodied people wanting to enter our country and work.
One hundred twenty-five thousand are coming from Afghanistan. Their travel is being managed by the U. S. State Department. Fifteen hundred are coming to North Carolina.
Humanitarian and religious groups all around the country are working over-time to receive and settle these refugees. Most are motivated by the clear command of Jesus, who said: “I was a stranger and you welcomed me.”
Hospitality towards the stranger, the refugee, the immigrant, and the homeless is the Christian virtue for our day. This ministry needs to be a line item in the budget of every church, mosque, synagogue, and temple.
At the Rio Grande, a different ethic prevails.
Haitians by the thousands have gathered in makeshift camps, most without water, food, medicine, or safety. They are like Moses of old who stood on Mt Nebo and looked over into the Promise Land. He never made it across the river; but his people did.
Centuries later our ancestors made it across the water. They were looking for freedom, opportunity, and prosperity. We are double heirs of this grand vocation—to leave home in search of a better place.
Haitians now join families from Mexico, Guatemala, El Salvador, and a dozen other countries where they speak Spanish or Portuguese. They want to speak English, earn dollars, and give glory to God in the church of their choice.
They want to be Americans!!
I pause a few minutes to consider the potential residing in these desperate but ambitious people. Among them are musicians, athletes, and ministers. Others aspire to be cooks, teachers, and engineers. Some will be poets, and some will be prophets. They will infuse our schools, churches, and communities with new songs of gratitude and grit.
They will become Americans. They will salute the flag, and join the army, and teach their child to sing “O beautiful for spacious skies, for amber waves of grain.”
They will do all this as millions of others have if we let them. If we see in their eyes the eyes of Jesus. If we hear in their voices the call of God. If we embrace the way of Jesus.
Many want to close the door. And bolt it. And post armed guards. And send posses of mounted men to whip these refugees back into their squalid tents.
They whipped Jesus, you remember, agents of the state trying to impose order on a misunderstood messiah and his dwindling band of brothers and sisters. Jesus knows. Jesus understands. Jesus lives among them under the bridge. He listens to their stories and leads them in prayer and blesses the bread as he breaks it for their dinner.
Jesus is on their side of the Rio Grande.
We think Jesus is on our side. In our large sanctuaries. Singing with our choir or clapping with our praise band. Maybe raising his hands in praise and adoration.
We think that is Jesus. But it isn’t. That’s not Jesus. It’s a cardboard cutout with a built-in computer programmed to sing like us, pray like us, and when it’s all over, go home and watch the game with us.
No. That’s not Jesus.
Jesus is under the bridge, wiping the blood from the back of the young father who sheltered his daughter from the whip of the white man.
Jesus pauses to pray for the family: Our father in heaven. You are the holy and righteous one. We want your will and way to be done here and now. Give us something to eat today. Forgive the men with the whip. Forgive us also if what we are doing is wrong and what we are seeking is foolish. Do not lead us into danger, or sin, or a trap. Deliver us from the evil before us and the evil back home. It is all yours, O God: this land before us, the sun above us, our friends around us, the yearning deep within us. It is all yours. And we give thanks.
And all the people mumbled Amen.
