United States (MNN) — Immigration enforcement is a hotspot of contention in the United States. Tensions have been boiling over with protests and riots in Minnesota State.
“This is an interesting time that we are living, because we know at the moment that the federal government is on a mission of doing something. I will not judge if that is just or not. That is not for me to say if it is right or wrong,” says Jehiel Ortiz, a missionary with Trans World Radio (TWR).
Ortiz works to reach Spanish speakers in the U.S. for Christ. He has noticed troubling divisions between believers over immigration enforcement that he thinks are not proper.
Stock photo courtesy of Priscilla Du Preez via Unsplash.
“We don’t need to say if we are in favor of the government or against the government. That is not a position of the church,” he says. “The position of the church is how [to find] the Kingdom values I can express and align with.”
Ortiz says God calls His people to honor the laws of the land in which they live. That means an illegal immigrant status is not acceptable. At the same time, Ortiz points to the two greatest commandments that Jesus named in Matthew 22: to love God with all that we are, and to love our neighbors as ourselves. To Ortiz, that means first caring for a person’s soul, then their legal status.
“The first thing is, ‘Do you know Christ?’ If that is not the case, if people don’t know Christ, then you preach them the gospel,” he says.
After that, love might look like seeking to understand the person’s story. What brought them to a new country? Are they stuck somewhere in the legal process? How do they need someone to come alongside them?
“Maybe a member of the church is a lawyer who can help [them] out. There are many ways that we can do that, but the idea is to say, ‘How can we respond with grace in a difficult situation?’” says Ortiz. “There are people who are facing situations that we need to help them in some way to [face], with one specific goal: that they can see the love of God.”
Radio Trans Mundial is TWR’s Spanish ministry in the United States. (Photo, caption courtesy of TWR)
In whatever country a Christian calls home, it’s crucial to think carefully and seek a biblical perspective on current events.
“The only way that you can do that is to spend time with God. Go to God first, and then go outside to share what God has put in your heart,” says Ortiz. “We need to pray, ‘God, how can we be the light and the salt that this society is needing?’”
For Spanish-speakers searching for biblical conversations on the experience of immigrants, check out Esperanza en el Camino (Hope Along the Way), created by the team at RTM USA, TWR’s Spanish-language ministry. The show points listeners to hope in Christ and practical ways the gospel touches daily life.
Header image is a stock photo courtesy of Jamaica Cabahug via Unsplash.
