"We are All Aliens"

1st Chronicles 29.15

“We are aliens and strangers in your sight, as were all our forefathers. Our days on earth are like a shadow, without hope.” NIV

“For we are strangers before You, and sojourners, as all our fathers were; our days on the earth are like a shadow, and there is no hope or expectation of remaining.” AMP

We are faced with a national crisis. Immigration reform will happen. If we rise up and deal responsibly with the issues, we may avoid a serious clash of cultures and painful losses to those on every side of the immigration issue. Reform will occur. It cannot be avoided. We can do it peaceably if we act quickly, or suffer tragic consequences if we procrastinate.

Would you commit a crime to save yourself? Would you break the law to feed your starving child? I would. Do I think its right? No. Do I have compassion for the lawbreaker? In this case, yes. Enforcing the law with an illegal alien may be the right thing to do, but will break a compassionate person’s heart.  

“People do not despise a thief if he steals to satisfy himself when he is starving. Yet when he is found, he must restore sevenfold; He may have to give up all the substance of his house.”

Proverbs 6.30-31 NKJV

About sixteen years ago, one hundred and sixty federal agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) conducted a raid on Fresh Del Monte Produce Inc. on North Rivergate Boulevard in Portland, Oregon. They arrested on hundred and sixty-seven undocumented immigrants most of whom were sent to a federal detention facility to face possible deportation. Imagine the sorrow and fear of Nicolas Siquina whose Guatemalan wife was one of the detainees. “Two months ago, Siquina, a permanent resident, filed documents to begin the process to win her legal status.” “I feel desperate” Siguina was reported saying in Spanish. “She’s all I got.”[1]

According to the Bible, you and I have something in common with Nicolas Siguina’s wife. We are both “aliens and strangers.” Our time on earth is “like a shadow” moving from the dawn of arrival to the dusk of our departure. This world is not my permanent home or possession. I will not forever keep my house, my clothes, or even my family. All of these precious things and people will be stripped away from me one day. I cannot stop the shadow of my life from shifting me towards its final destination. I have “no hope or expectation of remaining” here.

The best I can do is to make friends with Jesus Christ so when that time comes He will bring me safely back across the temporal border, dividing this life from the next, to the land of promise, my eternal home. 

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[1] The Oregonian, Sunrise Edition, Wednesday June 13, 2007, “Immigration raid pushes Oregon into thick of fight” and “In raid’s wake: panic, desperation and confusion,” p. A1, A 8-9.

Photo at top left is by David McNew (Getty Images).