The Quote Below: More Misinformation from the Media
“How did white evangelicals come to so fully embrace the Trumpian rhetoric on immigration? How did a religious group whose foundational sacred text explicitly mandates care for the poor, the sick, and the stranger become a reliable anti-refugee, anti-immigrant voting bloc?
“In January, a Washington Post/ABC poll found that a staggering 75 percent of white evangelicals in the US described “the federal crackdown on undocumented immigrants” as a positive thing, compared to just 46 percent of Americans overall. And according to a Pew Research Center poll in May, 68 percent of white evangelicals say that America has no responsibility to house refugees, a full 25 points over the national average. . . .
“The Bible contains numerous passages that seem to straightforwardly exhort care for the poor, immigrants, and refugees. . . . In Matthew 25 . . . Jesus warns his followers that those who withhold care from the poor or the refugee — “the least of these” — are seen as having done it to Jesus himself. Plenty of other verses — [such as] Leviticus 19:33-34, . . . — express similar sentiments.
“Generally speaking, white American evangelicals have, at least since the 1970s, been wary of counting nonwhites or non-Americans among this “least.”. . . That said, the age of Trump — and the Christian nationalism he has frequently evoked as a rhetorical campaign strategy — has seen white evangelical nativist rhetoric take on a more politicized role.” –- The Bible Says to Welcome Immigrants. So Why Don’t White Evangelicals?, Vox, 10/30/18 [Link]
Fact Check of Quote Above: This article cherry picks Bible verses to make its case, while ignoring the full context of what the Bible says about nationhood. Specifically, it teaches that God divided humanity into nations and set boundaries among them (Deut. 32:8). The purpose of this division was to encourage men to “seek after God” (Acts 17:26-27). The denial of nationhood is what sinful men proposed at Babel in the Book of Genesis when they proposed to unite all people as one and thereby defy God.
In the words of the Russian Christian author Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, “Nations are the wealth of mankind, they are its generalized personalities: the smallest of them has own particular colors, and embodies a particular facet of God’s design.” Significantly, the Book of Revelation reveals that nations will continue to exist even in heaven (Rev.21:24). When patriots strive to preserve the character of their nations, their efforts are completely consistent with biblical Christianity.
God used the nationhood of Israel to bring Christ into the world. For that purpose He commanded the Israelites to preserve their religious faith and—to a large extent—their ethnic identity, as shown in the Books of Ezra and Nehemiah. This is the context of those passages which call for love and welcoming of the “stranger.” Foreigners were allowed to dwell in Israel—temporarily or permanently—if they followed the laws and customs of Israel. (See the commentary of Old Testament scholar James K. Hoffmeir on this issue.)
Thus, there is no analogy between the practices of Old Testament Israel and the claim that we must allow entry to all migrants, regardless of whether they respect our laws. And similarly, the Old Testament in no way suggests that we are obliged to let foreigners push aside our national culture and impose multicultural confusion.
Matthew 25 discusses the issue of personal salvation, not requirements for national laws dealing with immigration. In that scripture, Christ warns against hostility or indifference to the “least of these, my brothers.” In the New Testament the term “brothers” refers to Christians. Thus the warning is against those who personally mistreat Christians—even the least of them. It is not inclusive of everyone.
The Bible does call for rulers to practice justice and equity toward their people. This is certainly not the case of the elites of our society who promote mass immigration for profits and power, while ignoring the well-being of most of their fellow Americans. Their attitudes toward “the “least” these countrymen is one of barely disguised contempt and hostility. The racial animus this article expresses toward white Christians and its use of the smear word “nativist” are cases in point.
It is apparent that mass immigration is a key component of globalism, the plan for a borderless world that some of our elites propose—a prominent example being the billionaire currency speculator George Soros. It may be no coincidence that globalism bears an unsettling resemblance to the agenda of Babel in the Old Testament. The Book of Revelation foretells the rise of a one-world state, a new Babel, called Babylon the Great. It will be ruled by “the merchants of the earth” who will deceive the nations.
American can and should help less fortunate countries, and this can include admission of a reasonable number of immigtants. But we will help no one if we open our borders completely and allow the world to overwhelm us. That would bring us confusion and chaos. Christians should reflect that God is not the author of confusion.