The God for Refugees

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Psalm 91:1-6, 9-16

You who live in the shelter of the Most High,
   

who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, 


will say to the Lord, ‘My refuge and my fortress;
   

my God, in whom I trust.’ 


For he will deliver you from the snare of the fowler
   

and from the deadly pestilence; 


he will cover you with his pinions,
   

and under his wings you will find refuge;
   

his faithfulness is a shield and buckler. 


You will not fear the terror of the night,
   

or the arrow that flies by day,

or the pestilence that stalks in darkness,
   

or the destruction that wastes at noonday.


Because you have made the Lord your refuge,
   

the Most High your dwelling-place, 
no evil shall befall you,
   

no scourge come near your tent.


For he will command his angels concerning you
   

to guard you in all your ways. 


On their hands they will bear you up,
   

so that you will not dash your foot against a stone. 


You will tread on the lion and the adder,
   

the young lion and the serpent you will trample under foot.


Those who love me, I will deliver;
   

I will protect those who know my name. 


When they call to me, I will answer them;
   

I will be with them in trouble,
   

I will rescue them and honor them. 


With long life I will satisfy them,
   

and show them my salvation.

Sermon: “The God for Refugees”

We were all piled in a hot, rickety passenger van.  The kids had their ipods and cameras, snapping blurry pictures out of the windows as we sped along.  Red dust swirled all around us, despite the fact that the windows were up.  When we finally arrived into the parking lot, we all piled out, grateful for fresh air.  The conversation and laughter died. 

Down below, we looked upon the largest township in Pietermaritzburg, South Africa.  Smoke rose from open fires, homes were made of mud, plywood or rusting tin.  There was no sanitation.  thousands of people, all of them black South Africans moved there by the government during Apartheid, called that township home. 

The trip back in our rickety van was much quieter.  One of the other leaders of our trip (which was a reconciliation project for Protestant and Catholic teenagers from Belfast), spoke up, her voice thick with emotion.

“You have a choice, you know,” she said.  “You can either pretend you never saw this, that you never saw that people live this way, and remain hard to it.  Or, you can let it break your heart.  God wants it to break your heart.”

And it did.  Suddenly, our ipods and digital cameras felt heavy with the weight of injustice.   In that township, children were growing up in extreme poverty because their government decided that was where they should have to live.  The elderly were forced to endure the extremes of weather, without adequate shelter.  And those who were able to work struggled to find transportation from the sprawling township on the outskirts of town to the places in the center where they could earn a living.  Life in that township was at times monotonously the same as conditions never improved, and at others, fearfully changeable as violence, storms and hunger took their toll.

You who live in the shelter of the Most High,
   

who abide in the shadow of the Almighty, 


will say to the Lord, ‘My refuge and my fortress;
   

my God, in whom I trust.’ 


I sat at a traffic light in Aberdeen the other day.  It was taking its sweet time to change, and instead of switching the radio to a better station or thinking of which errands I needed to run, I opened my eyes to see those around me (and no, I was not driving with my eyes closed!).  As people turned in front of me, I looked at their faces: a middle-aged woman with an absent expression on her face, eating a sandwich, clearly accustomed to multitasking. 

A child peering out of the back window of a car, trying to spot something exciting or unexpected, while his Dad looked bored. 

An older man in a button-up shirt, with a buttoned-up solemn expression on his worried face.

Two people, presumably a couple, faces both tight with irritation, one speaking emphatically to the other, clearly angry. 

And in that moment, I had a choice.  I could have pretended that my little red car was an island in this world, that the lives of those passing me by had no impact on my own.  I could have hardened myself to their exhaustion and pain, written right there on their faces when they thought no one was looking.  Or, I could let it break my heart. 

You will not fear the terror of the night,
   

or the arrow that flies by day, or the pestilence that stalks in darkness,
   

or the destruction that wastes at noonday. 

Because you have made the Lord your refuge, 

the Most High your dwelling-place, no evil shall befall you.

They are not that different, really, the people I saw in that massive township in South Africa years ago, and the people who passed before my eyes in Aberdeen the other day.  Like us, they all seek security and peace, and wonder if life will ever get easier.  Like us, they all face the exhaustion of endless days where we do not spot anything exciting or unexpected from our windows.  Like us, they know the fear that comes when life changes too quickly with violent actions, violent words, the violence illness does to our bodies and spirits.

For God will command his angels concerning you
   

to guard you in all your ways. 


On their hands they will bear you up,
   

so that you will not dash your foot against a stone.

Those who love me, I will deliver;
   

I will protect those who know my name.


The words of Psalm 91, when spoken in the midst of the injustice of systemic poverty and the disillusioned sorrow of people we pass every day, sounds like something of a fairy tale.  How is God a refuge to those who call a leaking piece of scrap metal a roof?  Where is this promised dwelling place of God, where the evils of apathy and busyness aren’t invited in?  What does it mean that we are delivered by God, when each day delivers more and more bad news?

Many pastors would just say one little three-letter word, “sin” and leave it at that.   The sin of racism and greed is why some are forced to live under leaky roofs.  The sin of worshipping our schedules is what keeps us from God’s peace.  The sin of environmental abuse, increased selfishness and failure to help those struggling most, leads to bad things happening with greater and greater frequency.

There is some truth to each of these statements.  But each of these statements assumes something very wrong about God:  they assume that our sinfulness can keep God from dwelling with us.  That is simply not true.  Or, at least, that is not the God I believe in.

You see, the God I believe in wandered with a refugee people in the wilderness in a pillar of cloud and fire to guide them.  That pillar of God’s presence wasn’t way up in the sky for those who took the time to look for it.  It was right in front of their eyes, guiding them all the way, even when they grumbled and gave up.

The God I believe in promised shelter under wings of grace, not just as pretty poetry, but as a present reality for those who felt most lost and unworthy.

The God I believe in was born in a barn (perhaps with a leaking roof) and called that dirty, smelly place the dwelling of the Most High, because he came to defeat sin with love once and for all.

 

The God I believe in sees us as we really are, and knows that we are all, in one way or another, refugees in search of home:

The intelligent child who must overcome incredible obstacles to be the first in her family to go to college, because she lives in that township in Pietermaritzburg.

The Syrian family who must leave their country to survive, even if that survival means an overcrowded camp full of strangers.

The busy mother who doesn’t even have time to feel her own loneliness, much less open up to someone else about it.

The arguing couple who believe they always have to put up a brave face of being happy and in love when they don’t even know how to talk to each other anymore.

The older man in a buttoned-up shirt who, deep down, in a place he never admits to anyone, fears that he will become irrelevant or lose his independence.

The young adult who feels he knows many people but that no one really knows, or loves, him.

This world is absolutely full of refugees – us included.

And the God who made us has a choice.  God could just look past the suffering of us refugee people, pretending not to see it.  God could become hardened to our hardships, and remain distant and disconnected from our lives. 

But the good news is this: God doesn’t.  God sees each of us fully, taking in all of our joy and pain, and God’s heart breaks for us.  And then, this broken-hearted God, says, “Right there.  That place of suffering, of isolation, of fear, that is exactly where I will go.” 

And those places in our lives and this world we thought most desolate, most deserted and desperate, become dwelling places of the divine.   

Never forget that this world is made up of refugees seeking home.  Never let your heart grow hard to your own suffering or the suffering of another.  And never lose hope in the God who wanders with us, promising,

When they call to me, I will answer them;
   

I will be with them in trouble,
   

I will rescue them and honor them. 


With long life I will satisfy them,
   

and show them my salvation. 

Thanks be to God!  Amen.