I’ve been lamenting this week.
I went to church in Tanzania with Americans who worked for USAID. So when I think about foreign aid programs abruptly cut off, I think about those American families who uprooted their children to make a difference in developing countries and suddenly have no job. I think about local people employed by those agencies who suddenly have no way to feed their families. And, of course, I think about the impoverished people who benefit from those programs.
I hear Americans saying that this is justified because we need to help our own people first, that we have people in poverty here, people suffering from natural disasters. But then I consider how America’s foreign aid to other countries last year was only about 70 billion dollars. Which sounds like a lot until you consider that 70 billion dollars is less than 1 percent of the Federal Budget. Which still may sound like a lot until you realize that Americans spent 960 billion dollars on Christmas in 2024.
The United States has 4 percent of the world’s population and 30 percent of the world’s wealth. So do we have an obligation to help other countries? I think so. Especially when you consider that much of the world’s poverty contributes to our wealth — as in the cobalt industry in Congo.
On the other hand, living overseas has also made me very aware that government aid programs need much reform. I’ve read Dead Aid. I’ve read When Helping Hurts. But is drastically yanking the funding out under their feet the most effective way for reform? That just seems like a good way to create more instability and poverty.
I know hundreds of immigrants by name. I have Tanzanian friends who won the Green Card Lottery and now live in the States. As a school principal in Tanzania, some of my students were “anchor babies”—African or Asian children whose mothers flew to the U.S. to give birth solely to get their children U.S. citizenship. I’ve helped in after-school programs for children whose parents were undocumented. I’ve met refugee families who have built beautiful lives in America.
Even my children are immigrants, for goodness sake. I am intimately acquainted with the I-130, the N600K, the I-600, the I-485, and the B-2 visa applications, and I spent thousands of dollars to get them approved. I’ve scoured the instructions for these visas so carefully that I’ve sometimes known more about them than embassy consular officers or USCIS officers. The gray hairs on my head are named after visa applications.
So when I sense this mood of anti-immigration swirling around me, I take it personally. I see the faces of friends. I see the faces of my own children. And I know people would never say that my children aren’t welcome here. That my children aren’t those kind of immigrants. But that’s my point – all the clampdowns, loss of funding, and careless denigrating comments about immigrants don’t specify that there are many different kinds of immigrants. Refugees are not the same as asylum seekers which are not the same as illegal border crossers which are not the same as anchor babies which are not the same as adopted children.
Yet each has a face, a name, a story. Each is made in the image of God.
I think we all can agree, without a doubt, that we are not in favor of criminals and drug dealers and rapists immigrating to our country and that we need better ways of keeping them out. But when all the bad guys are thrown into the same pot as the vast majority of people who just want freedom and justice and a place to live without bombs and the Taliban and drug lords, I am indignant. On behalf of my friends. On behalf of my children.
As an American, I believe that strength comes from diversity of perspective and culture. With falling birthrates, the U.S. needs immigration to be sustainable. Plus, the U.S. economy is projected to increase by 9 trillion dollars in the next ten years because of the immigration surge.
As a Christian, I’m thrilled by the opportunities to live out the gospel in the lives of millions of people on our soil who might never be introduced to Jesus in their own country.
I can believe these things and still believe that an open border is not wise and that our country desperately needs immigration reform. (Trust me, I’ve experienced the dumpster fire of U.S. immigration up close and personal.)
I realize I may regret sharing these thoughts with the world. Our country has reached a frenzied pitch of political tension and the last thing I want to do is add to the noise. My prayer is to add perspective.
My fellow American Christians, I implore you:
Remember that to whom much has been given, much will be required. We are living in the most powerful, most wealthy country that has ever existed in the history of the earth. Even Americans who are struggling financially are still richer than more than 90% of the world’s population. We are the aristocracy of the world. It is true that we, as a nation and as an American Church, cannot help everyone. But when our country holds 30% of the world’s wealth, we wield an extremely powerful influence.
Let us not be flippant. Let us be sober-minded, recognizing our power and the responsibility that comes with it. Let us consider this responsibility with grave, thoughtful, careful, prayerful mindfulness. Let us not be guided by fear or by anger, by entitlement or selfishness, but let us hold the weight of what we have been given, remembering that one day, every American Christian will be held accountable for how we stewarded or squandered the vast freedom and wealth we have been given.
Let us remember that those of us who were born American and have access to a U.S. passport did nothing to deserve it. We won the DNA lottery. In God’s sovereign grace, He has chosen us to belong to this privileged country and time in history. Let us live as those who recognize the depth of the privilege we possess. And to whom much has been given, much will be required.
We may not have control over government policies or executive orders, but there is much we can control. We can cheer on reform but still speak well of immigrants, welcome and befriend them well. We can give generously and then give some more to international development projects. If we are involved in international business, we can choose justice and integrity over profit. We can advocate for America to welcome refugees – arguably the most deserving, most vetted, and the most vulnerable immigrants out there. And we can live our lives in a way that prioritizes the kingdom of God so much more than a kingdom on earth.
I love this movie about refugees: The Good Lie and look forward to watching this one: Between Borders. I also love these books: Everything Sad is Untrue, After the Last Border, and Nowhere Boy (great for a read aloud with kids).
* Pictures by Gil Medina on Zanzibar Island
