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You're listening to Radio Luke's Lucid. I'm your host Steve Matthews. Thanks for joining me today for Radio Luke's Lucid episode 23. This episode is titled a closer look at the evangelical immigration table.
So I'm watching the news this past week and you may have seen some of the the films or some of the pictures from from last Sunday I'm talking about let's see that would have been Sunday November the 25th 2018 and and you might have seen something that looked a little bit like I've actually called it called it the Battle of San Ysidro it it's it's where several hundred of these Central American migrants in the the migrant caravan as they they like to call it seems more like an invasion mob to me but they they call it a migrant caravan and they tried to rush the border and and tried to actually cross over from Mexico Tijuana which is on one side of the board and they tried to cross over into San Ysidro which is on the the California side of the border and they were repelled and there were.
There's a lot of commentary in the news about well a lot of focus on the fact that the the Border Patrol used tear gas in this type of thing to to drive off the crowd. Well I'm glad that they did what they did the Border Patrol that is I thought their response was very reasonable but there's been a lot of melting down in the press over this past week and and that's not surprising given the way our our political commentary is is very very emotional and anytime something like that appears to be maybe someone might be hurt or or someone's being treated you know apparently in a picture unfairly.
Well there there are a lot of people that want to come out and start saying that somehow Donald Trump's done something wrong or that the Border Patrol has done something wrong or that Americans are wrong for questioning the the whole migrant invasion story.
So anyway I've spent a lot of time the last actually few months writing that series on mass migration Mexico and the example of Moses and during that series I spent a lot of time talking about the Roman Catholic Church and the Roman Church States they call the Roman Catholic Church the Roman Church State.
That's something that does a term that John Robbins coined and it's one that I like quite a bit because it really kind of emphasizes the idea that Rome is not only a church but it's also a political organization.
It's a very very politically involved organization and a lot of people don't seem to realize that and I think a lot of that is due to the fact that it's not really reported that way in the press. But that's kind of I don't want to go too far down that that line of thinking that's maybe something for another time.
But what I did want to talk about a little bit here today was was not so much the the Roman Catholic side of things as I've hit that pretty hard here recently and I'm sure I'm gonna come back and talk about it some more but I got to thinking to myself this past week you know with with all of this stuff going on what are the evangelicals saying.
You know so what are evangelicals saying you know what are the the people who hold themselves out there to speak for the evangelical community actually saying about about the migrants. And so I did a little bit of research and I went to one of my old standbys.
It's a group called the evangelical immigration table the evangelical immigration table the the L evangelical immigration table maybe to maybe answer the first question so who is the evangelical immigration table.
It's actually a group of groups is the way they present themselves. They have a website and they describe themselves this way. They say the evangelical immigration table is a broad coalition of evangelical organizations and leaders advocating for immigration reform consistent with biblical values.
And they list out there's about half a dozen different ones. There's the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention now that's a that that might be in some ways one of the most influential and best known of these groups that is a group that's currently headed up by by dr. Russell Moore who and we'll get to dr. Moore here at some point a little more specifically in this podcast at least I hope we will but just to kind of introduce him if you haven't seen him before heard anything that he said he quite possibly is the very worst evangelical I've ever heard on the issues of immigration.
And you gotta understand to one thing about the evangelical immigration table and Russell Moore and some of his other compadres and that is they hold themselves out to be biblical Christians now I mean some of the stuff you know you would expect somebody like say I don't know Jim Wallace you know sojourners.
I mean he obviously would be be pretty down with the whole the whole migrant mob invasion thing. I would expect that he would be that way. But what these are these people in the evangelical immigration table claim to be Bible believing Christians.
They claim to be evangelicals. They claim to speak for the evangelical community. They claim to be you know they claim to to be putting forth immigration proposals consistent with the Bible. I don't think they do that and in fact I think there are some major problems with some of the things they talk about.
I'm gonna touch on that a little bit. I I tend to keep I want to keep this kind of a high-level discussion here something it would actually probably take maybe several podcasts to make it will do that to kind of really drill down into it a little bit in some detail but I just kind of want to give you a little flavor of what the evangelical immigration table is.
Like the a few of the other organizations of the Korean churches for community development. There's the National Association of Evangelicals the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference the Wesleyan Church world relief and world vision.
So those are the the groups that list themselves as making up the evangelical immigration table all right. So so much for that now. As far as what was their response to the to the caravan. Well it's it's kind of interesting here.
So let's let's start with this. This is actually a press release from October 30th so this is from about a little bit over a month ago. Now at this point I'm recording this on December the December the 1st 2018 so a little bit over a month ago but this is when the the caravan was still well down in in Mexico.
I don't know if they even got had crossed into Mexico at this point yet or not. They the caravan started in Honduras and Honduras they went to Guatemala then from Guatemala they went to Mexico and now they're on the US Mexico border.
But this was about a month ago and so I'll just read a little bit of this here to you. The headline says evangelical leaders call for compassionate response to caravan and the it's Washington DC is where this was released from this press release and it continues.
It says evangelical leaders released a statement today encouraging churches to pray for Central American migrants making their way through southern Mexico toward the US Mexico border and to join calls for comprehensive compassionate immigration solutions.
Quote. Beyond the role of the government we encourage churches both in the US and in Latin America to respond with Christlike love to the vulnerable families and individuals who form this caravan and quote they write and they continue here.
Quote. We also invite you to continue to join us in calling for a comprehensive solution to our deeply broken immigration system which limits our government's ability to effectively manage a large influx of asylum seekers and to protect those whose lives are in danger.
End quote. And then they provide some some quotes from from different people involved with with evangelical immigration tabler or EIT I should just call it EIT for short. So these are some different people and here's one this Shirley Hoogstra he's president of the Council of Council for Christian Colleges and Universities and she says the caravan represents extraordinary complexity.
Yet these times require questions to be clear about. God requires of us to love him and our neighbor dearly and to do justice love love mercy and walk humbly with our God who's not daunted by complexity.
It won't be easy it will be costly it will be right. Well one of the things that you notice and in some of the statements that some of the quotes I've already read here so far it was a great deal of talk about compassion and loving our neighbors.
But one of the things that it seems like the evangelical immigration table folks forget and this is almost always the case anytime you have someone talking about immigration and that is you know so who is my neighbor.
Well you know my fellow American is my neighbor too you know in this Shirley Hoogstra I mean she sits here and she talks you know she talks about you know having all this compassion and love and mercy for people from say Honduras.
Well you know I think I'm called to have passion love love and concern for my fellow American citizens. Yeah and in one of the you know something else here it may be another way of putting this is it it seems like when you read through the statements of the EIT people they're no different than the kind of things that you might get out of the US Conference of Catholic bishops or out of some you know very left-wing secular organization they all talk pretty much the same way.
And one of the basic assumptions is this is that the the migrants the immigrants the asylees the refugees they are worthy and deserving of infinite compassion infinite understanding infinite amounts of money infinite amounts of prayer and concern.
And the American people who are expected to provide all of this well they don't even exist. And if they do exist basically they exist as a as a sort of ATM to be able to finance all of the righteous claims of every immigrant migrant refugee asylee from anywhere in the world at any time there's never any talk about compassion for the American people who have to bear the costs.
And that can be in terms of financial costs that can be in terms of criminal activity. I mean it's not hard to find examples of people who have entered this country illegally or even legally but but maybe especially illegally you know who have murdered who have committed rape who have killed by drunk driving and that doesn't even get into some of the other economic problems that can be caused by people who come into the country illegally who disregard our laws.
You know one of the things I find really astonishing about all of this is it seems to me that respect for immigration law. It seems to me that that's a bit of a litmus test. Okay you know there's that saying you never get a second chance to make a good first impression.
Well I think there's something to be said for that there's an application to that with regard to immigration. I mean if someone has so little respect for our immigration laws that they just cross over the United States completely disregarding US law why should I trust that person.
Is that somebody that I want as a neighbor. Because I think that really does go to character. You know if someone disregards immigration laws well what other laws are they going to disregard. Well they may not like US immigration laws.
And maybe US immigration laws can be better. I'm not saying that's not possible. But you know there are lots of laws that I don't particularly like but I do try to keep them and I do respect them. I mean we're not called as Christians to just go and keep only those laws that we like and then we agree with you know I mean I file my income taxes.
I don't think there should be an income tax but I file my income taxes. You know that's just one example of that sort of thing. But I mean these people will cross over the border many of them and they have no concern about that they don't even seem to think they're actually really breaking the law.
And then on top of that now granted this was written back on October the 30th but I mean you can see that the people in this caravan many of them and I would say probably all of them by you know maybe guilt by Association since they're all kind of hanging together are guilty of having real disregard for the rule of law.
Back when they were when the the caravan was coming from Guatemala into Mexico they actually forced the border. They just rushed it they overwhelmed it they knocked down fences they came streaming through you know they they ignored what the law enforcement officers were telling them.
And then they got to the u .s. border and they tried to do the same thing you know and they found that maybe it wasn't quite as easy as what they they thought that it was going to be. I don't know. Maybe they were told they could just waltz right across the border.
You know. And now you find that there are a number of people that are complaining you know about about their situation. Well it's a situation that they created for themselves by doing something extraordinary extraordinarily foolish doing something extraordinarily lawless.
You know they've put themselves in a very bad position. Yeah. And and when you're you're crashing the border from Guatemala to Mexico and you try to rush the border of the United States. Well I'll tell you that that has something you know from my standpoint as I watch that as an American you know whatever sympathy I may have wanted to have for somebody that maybe came out of a bad situation is done.
It's history. It's evaporated. I mean when when people act like that they cannot get out of my country or leave the vicinity to my country fast enough. And that's something that they brought on themselves by their own behavior.
But I mean this if you read through the evangelical immigration table you know you would think that every one of these people that's some sort of super saint you know whose feet don't touch the ground.
Let's say let's take a quote here from Russell Moore since I brought him up here's a quote in this section calling for a compassionate treatment of the migrants. President Russell Moore president ethics and religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.
Here's what he has to say. Quote. People fleeing for their lives are not to be used as political props. Those escaping violence and persecution in Honduras and elsewhere bear the image of God and should be treated with dignity and compassion.
Okay. So yeah you know we say okay they shouldn't be used as political props. But I mean who's using them as political props. I mean who's who referring to. Is he referring to say the the president is referring to the Border Patrol.
Is he talking about the president rope. Who's maybe told them not to come. In very clear language he told them not to come. Don't do it. You're not coming into the country. You know what about you know political props.
They have some of the organizations that are trying to push this like for instance Pueblos Sin Fronteras. That's the group with that means people without borders in Spanish. And they're one of the principal organizing groups behind this.
You know what about the activities of the Roman Catholic Church that have promoted this. What about the activities. What about the statements of of the the president president of Mexico the new president he was just sworn in on December the 1st.
I'm talking here about the Andres. I always have to stop and think about this Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador. Yes there we go. AMLO AMLO AMLO. That's what they call him in the Mexican press. Is AMLO. And and all of the the nonsense that he was talking during the election about how he was gonna defend the right of every person to come to the United States every migrant from every country in the world.
I mean he actually literally said this. That that was he. That's what he was going to do. You know what you know. Isn't that using people as a political football. Is that what Russell Moore means here.
I mean it's kind of hard to say but but I kind of suspect if you you look at kind of the body of of Russell Moore's work he's probably really referring to President Trump. Probably. Yeah. And he goes on.
He talks about those who bear the image of God should be treated with dignity and compassion. Okay. Yes. I mean as Christians we are to treat our fellow human beings with dignity and compassion. But again you know to whom does this apply.
And Russell Moore seems to think it applies strictly to those who are migrants. He for Russell Moore I mean does he have any compassion. Does he have any care. Does he think his fellow Americans deserve dignity and compassion because he's willing to take these people and foist them and their problems on the United States.
I saw some report this past week they said a third of the people in his caravan have serious illnesses. A third of them what happens if they come to the United States and people get sick. Maybe somebody dies because of that I say.
And that's in addition to all of the other potential problems that they can cause. Don't our fellow Americans deserve to be treated with dignity and compassion. You know I'm not sure that Russell Moore would answer that question is yes.
I'm you know I'm sure if you put that to him maybe he would but it seems that when it comes to being treated with dignity and compassion that the migrants deserve that more than than maybe maybe his fellow Americans.
So anyway that's that's some of that was what Russell Moore has to say to also turn to a statement because this was a statement that was issued to it was addressed to signatories of the evangelical immigration table.
And you know once again you know you kind of go through this this letter and it starts off you've probably seen in the news about a large group of migrants making the way to through Central America and Mexico apparently seeking to reach the United States.
And again this is a written on October 30th. I don't know why they say apparently I think it's kind of interesting the way this whole migrant caravan thing has been maybe should call it the invasion mob but the way that the whole invasion mob thing has been been covered in the press because they they always use terms like well possibly or apparently or or something like this that has always been their intention from the very beginning and I don't think there's ever been any doubt about that but yet you know the way these things are written they they make it sound as though somehow there is doubt about that.
But anyway this this letter it was actually written by Leith Anderson, Scott Arbeiter, and Shirley Hoogstra, Hypen, I don't know if I'm pronouncing this name right, Hypen Im, Joanne Lyon, and Russell Moore.
So there's our good friend Russell Moore and the letter kind of goes on for a little bit here and let's find a relevant portion here. Okay here we go as Christians we know that each of these individuals is a person made in God's image with inherent dignity.
Well okay fine a neighbor whom we are commanded to love our care for them is either love for a brother or sister in Christ. I don't know when I look at this migrant caravan do you see anything that looks terribly Christian about it.
It's kind of funny. I I don't really see that and in fact everything that I see around this migrant caravan if nothing else it sounds more like sort of Roman Catholic slash Marxist liberation theology than anything else it doesn't seem to be anything Christian about the philosophy that's behind this group and I find it kind of extraordinary that they would make a statement implying that somehow this this group is is it maybe has a lot of Christians in it.
I'm pretty sure that that's not the case. And they continue and we say we encourage the church to pray both for these individual migrants and for the elected officials in each country. And when you click on there's actually a link for the word pray and when you click on the word pray let's see it takes us to.
Okay yeah it takes us to a page and it has prayers for every month when you when you do this it takes you to to a link one of the the prayers this is for the month of November. It's the most recent one that's up and it says many of you have probably heard what has unfolded over the past several days at the border between Tijuana Mexico and California.
So this is pretty recent. This is just within the last week the port of entry San Ysidro which have been the focus of news reports of some members of the migrant caravan and they've got that in quotes came in a conflict with Border Patrol.
It says it's an 11-minute drive from our house as a pastor trying my best to follow Jesus call and so this is actually a prayers written by a gentleman named John Huckins. He says he's the co-founder director of the global immersion project.
It's interesting here because he talks about let's see he encourages his readers to pray also for the Christ followers on the ground who seeking to faithfully follow Jesus in this moment we know that peace is not passive it is costly for require we move toward the move toward the conflict with tools to hear rather than to destroy.
There are many in local churches on both sides of the border and among those who have traveled north from Honduras Guatemala and El Salvador seeking to live this out. And he encourages people to make a tangible response at the border.
And then he closes he says as we enter the Advent season and prepare to celebrate Christ coming let's all commit ourselves to praying for peace in the midst of the chaos and violence of our world. Okay so you read through this thing and he makes it sound like okay you know let's pray for both sides because both sides are really are morally equivalent.
You know it kind of reminds me a little bit back in the day you know when I was a kid growing up during the Cold War you had people that was always trying we're always trying to make the moral equivalence between communism and capitalism and it's a oh you know you got your communists over here and they're doing their thing and you got your your your capitalists over here and they're doing their thing and you know and they're both legitimate systems and you know hey what's you know why why criticize one another.
Well they're not morally equivalent. I mean here you have a case we have a group that has actually literally tried to invade the United States of America in total disregard for our laws. And you have you know that's the side of the migrants and then on the other side you have the Border Patrol who's actually trying to protect the United States of America and the property of the United States of America and the people of the United States of America.
I mean if I were to pray for those migrants I would pray this that they would get some that God would knock some sense into them and they go home. I mean what they're doing is ridiculous and I pray for the Border Patrol that they would have discretion and understanding and that they would stand firm but I'm pretty sure that's probably not the kind of prayer that that John Hawkins is looking for.
Interestingly enough too there is there's some links in this this letter there's just link after link after link on this page and you can kind of find yourself getting far away pretty soon on pretty quickly on on the evangelical immigration table but when you click on a link from this John Hawkins article it takes you to another article it appears to be be off-site.
It's not the evangelical immigration table. It's some outfit called the global immersion project and here's the headline says December 15th 2018 a day of cross-border solidarity. Now if you study have studied at all the the social teaching of the Roman Church state you know that solidarity is one of the favorite buzzwords of Antichrist.
I'm talking about the Pope here and in his henchmen. You know people such as say the US Conference of Catholic bishops they love to talk about solidarity. You know. So what is solidarity. Well you know they Rome was kind of given to some vague vague definitions.
John Robbins talked some about this in his book ecclesiastical megalomania and just kind of reading through Roman Catholic sources and kind of trying to sort of suss out a definition of based on how they use the term.
It's a vague he John Robbins said it means something like a vague sort of collectivism. And I would raise this question so why is a group called the evangelical immigration table have someone writing in association with that group who's linking to an article that talks about cross-border solidarity.
You know that is a social justice Roman Catholic term that is not a Christian term. Yeah I think it's interesting. I guess this is what it says here. It says that on December 15th we I guess the people who are involved with the global immersion project it says we will rock across the border together equipped with a tent and sleeping bag.
Each of these items are urgently needed in a makeshift migrant shelters. And they represent our solidarity with the asylum seekers from Central America. Well I don't want to have solidarity with asylum seekers from Central America.
I don't even like the term solidarity. You know what I would like them to do as they said is to repent of their foolishness and go home. I mean that's what they need to do. You know. And yet you have these people and I can't really tell whether a global immersion project.
I don't know if that's a it's hard to say from just looking at this web page where that's a Christian website or not. Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. I don't know but it's you know it's the same sort of nonsense that you would expect to see as I said before from the US Conference of Catholic bishops from these lefty secular social justice types.
You know something out of the UN for example. Anyway I just wanted to kind of give you a little bit of a flavor of this a few other things maybe that are interesting about the evangelical immigration table.
If you search their website you won't find any reference to birthright citizenship. There's zero references to that. So they never talk about that. They talk in a number of places about having compassion on say dreamers.
You know the DACA folks they thought that the DACA was awesome and they wanted to to give everybody. I think basically give everybody citizenship or at least a pathway to citizenship. But yet they don't want to do anything at all to actually address the serious issue of birthright citizenship.
You know they say oh well we want to uphold you know immigration policies consistent with biblical values. But they say nothing about birthright citizenship. Birthright citizenship is one of the biggest frauds going.
There is no biblical mandate for birthright citizenship. And what do I mean by birthright citizenship. That's just the idea that say someone can come into the United States of America. Maybe somebody sneaks across the border from Mexico.
Maybe a woman does gives birth in the United States very often a taxpayer expense and voila instant American citizen. And the reason is because that child was born on US soil. That's how birthright citizenship is interpreted.
It is insane is a gross abuse of American citizenship and it is extraordinary costly to the American people. There's a there's so much more that could be said about that and I don't want to get too far down that road today as I said I want to keep this kind of high level here today.
You know they they claim on the one hand to want to uphold biblical values and immigration but yet they do absolutely nothing that would actually benefit the American people and most importantly be in be in compliance with what scripture teaches about citizenship.
But yeah there's there is no no mandate for birthright citizenship in the Bible. I'll just leave it at that today. Maybe one last thing in closing here there was always interesting things with as I said with Russell Moore and Russell Moore is probably one of the as I said he's probably the single worst evangelical when it comes to anything having to do with immigration migration refugees.
And here's just to kind of give you a little more flavor about what Russell Moore is like. Here's a headline. This is from a website called Christian headlines. Russell Moore speaks out against proposed refugee cap reduction.
So earlier this year I think it was back in September the Trump administration had come out and said well they want to reduce the number of refugees admitted in the United States to 15 ,000 which is quite a bit less I think the number and in other years had been well over 50 ,000.
So that's it's a substantial reduction. Here's what Russell Moore says. Quote. Seeing yet another drop in refugee numbers should be a shock to the. And he continues one day we will be ashamed that we as a nation turn inward and away from our great tradition of serving as a beacon of liberty to those fleeing for their lives.
End quote. Now here's one of the things that Russell Moore really never addresses. In fact nobody really at the evangelical immigration table addresses nobody at the US Conference of Catholic bishops ever addresses.
And that is the fact that when someone comes the United States as a refugee or as an asylee. Whether you're a refugee or an asylee it doesn't matter. Those people are eligible for the full panoply of the welfare state.
So when you're bringing these people on as refugees when you're bringing people in as asylees essentially what you're doing is you're making the award of the state. Which is another way of saying they go in the dole.
Which is another way of saying you and me and if you happen to be American anyway are paying to support these people. Well that is you know government charity. And this is maybe one of the biggest errors when you read through evangelical immigration table statements they never distinguish or they never define what charity is.
You know they're talking talking talking talk about compassion. You know talk about Matthew 25 and about how Matthew 25 says oh we have to to welcome the stranger. And and this that and the other thing.
Okay you know as Christians yes we're supposed to welcome a stranger. We're supposed to to have compassion. But what is Christian charity. You know Christian charity is giving of one's own resources. Christian charity is giving of one's own time giving out of one's own money or some other type of a resource.
You know think about the example of the Good Samaritan. Right. You know the Good Samaritan you know he found that that poor man had been robbed and beaten and he took he he went out of his way to help this man he took him back to you know he he bound up his wounds so use some of his own resources.
He he put him on his I think it was it was a donkey that he was riding. I don't have the text here in front of me but he put him on his animal he took him back into town put him up in an inn he paid for the inn for this man's stay.
So in other words this this Good Samaritan gave of his own time and energy and resources money. But when these people come into the United States when these migrants these refugees come in they go on the government dole.
You know that's socialism. You know in another word for socialism is theft. But yet the evangelical immigration table the writers are they never quite get around to talking about that in the same way that the US Congress of Catholic bishops never quite get around these guys never quite get around to talking about that you know so they primp and pre and say look how awesome and compassionate we are yet in the end I mean what they're doing is they're taking other people's money.
Yeah I mean they're actually worse. You think of there's that story about Jesus in the in the New Testament and you know the they're there I think it's in Jerusalem and there's rich people putting in lots of money in the coffers and they're making a big deal and everybody says oh these rich people they're so awesome they're so amazing you know.
And then there's a the woman who goes everything she gives her a little her might the widow's might you know penny or something like that a little copper coin and Jesus says you know that she gave more than they did but but here's the thing you know at least these people these rich people who are making a big pretense and you know trying to get attention so I would say oh you're so holy you're so wonderful all that stuff.
Yeah these people were bad because they were they were parading their righteousness around but at least they were doing it with their own money. I mean these guys like I say these evangelical immigration types these US Conference of Catholic bishops types they want to be compassionate with your money and they get out there and they talk about how wonderful we are because we want to give away taxpayer money to people who aren't even Americans.
And then they think somehow that that makes them morally superior and that somehow they're they're they're welcoming the stranger. Well that's nonsense. All they're doing is calling for is mass government theft.
But why is it that very few people seem to see that. I don't understand why that's a problem and why that's so difficult to see but apparently it is and and so that's one of the reasons why I'm doing this anyway that's probably about enough for today as you can tell I'm kind of passionate about this subject and and so anyway thank you very much for taking the time to listen I really do appreciate that until next time may the spirit of truth guide you in all truth as you read and study God's Word.