Sermon of the week.

Refugees have been around for a long time. Where there are humans, there will be war and oppression, in fact, a good portion of our country was made up of refugees fleeing war or persecution.

At one time, even the peace loving Mennonites were considered a threat to the state, persecuted for their faith, and forced to sneak across borders in the dead of night in search of refuge. When they finally reached freedom, they immediately set up colonies where they kept to themselves and followed their own religious customs and rules.

Now does this mean that we must agree with Islam? No.

Does this mean that we should not properly vet people coming in? No.

Does this mean that people should be free to break the law? No.

My point is simply that refugees have been around for a long time. I don’t think we can blame people for taking their families and running away from hatred and violence, especially when we consider that a lot of us are descendants of people who did exactly the same thing.

There are news outlets who claim the current refugee situation is something new. However, it is easy to prove that having war and refugees around isn’t really that new of a situation in our world. Really, a lot of news outlets exist to make money and an easy product to sell is fear. Fear is profitable, fear is also a great way to get people to fall in line with your agenda, whatever that agenda is.

May I suggest that we’d be better off following a different agenda than fear, that we’d be better off following an agenda of faith instead?

Yes, I know, there is word that evil people are using the refugees as a part of a political game. As a matter of fact, this could well be true. Humans have been known to take advantage of other humans from time to time. However, does that mean that we too should take advantage of other people and oppress them?

Wouldn’t it be more radical to help those who are being oppressed?

Since some of the loudest voices on this issue would claim to be Christians, I would address the following questions to those who claim to follow the teachings of Jesus.

Didn’t Jesus mention something about loving even your enemies and that his followers being known by their love?

In a world full of hatred and selfishness, what if the most revolutionary thing a Christian could do would be to live out the teachings found in one of Jesus’s sermons, The Sermon on the Mount?