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Hi from the Salvation Army. You're listening to Words of Life. These are the words, these are the words, these are the words of life. These are the words, these are the words, these are the words of life. Hey, welcome back to Words of Life.
Today is our third episode with our panel of ministry leaders who all work in some of society's most difficult challenges. In this episode, we discuss refugees. There's a lot of stigma and misinformation surrounding this topic. But today, Major Sandra Pawar helps us shine a light on the real human story of what actually causes a family to flee their homeland and what the church's role should be in responding with compassion, wisdom, and the love of Christ. There's quite a few things that cause a family to flee their homeland.
Things like war, persecution. Violence. Poverty. Climate change, all those things definitely play a part in why a family or individual would choose to leave. Were they?
Originated from. And I say choose very loosely because I don't think anyone really chooses to leave a place that they love and that is their home. But often they feel like there's no other choice but to leave. Why do you think refugees are often maybe misunderstood or even dehumanized? Um there's definitely a large lack of education and understanding, but what do you think is is the source of that?
I think that you said it. It's lack of education and understanding. And I can even think, you know, about myself. I didn't know anything about refugees or immigration or asylum seekers. I was somebody who was going through an immigration process about 20 years ago.
I had come into America, like what I would say, legally through the system, and then had to leave the country for a year because my visa had expired. And I remember I was just very upset that I was hearing about other people being able to come in or they'd come in illegally and things like that. And I just thought it was a very simple policy issue and that people were just not doing things the right way. But then I went to the UK and while I was there, I was invited to a memorial service for for a a a person that I didn't actually know whose it was that I was going to. I was just invited to go and it was for this little boy named Alan Curdy, who was two years old.
He was fleeing from Syria with his family and he was washed up on a beach in Turkey. His story like hit the world and hit the news and the headlines and That's when I learned about the refugee crisis and why people flee and why people have to leave their homelands. And it disturbed me. I call it a holy disturbance. Like God just really shook me, and He said, I want you to learn about this issue.
People are just afraid because they don't understand. They haven't met anyone personally, they haven't listened to their stories. They've listened to what the media says. What politicians say without looking at facts, without really researching. And then we all hype each other up to get on this bandwagon.
And I do understand that there is fear sometimes when you don't know people, you don't know where they come from, you don't know their culture, and you fear that they might take your jobs, they might come into your country and bring violence. But again, that's just a lack of understanding about what is really happening and a fear that is man-made, I believe. Hey, you're listening to the Salvation Army's Words of Life. We're gonna take a quick ad break and we'll be right back. I'm Christy Graham, host of the show On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse, and I recently attended an infectious disease training and donned personal protective equipment alongside our staff who are preparing to serve at one of our Ebola treatment centers in the DRC.
That's really putting into perspective what our teams do. Listen to this behind-the-scenes episode by searching On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse, wherever you get your podcasts. Again, that's on the ground with Samaritan's Purse. I can't imagine the circumstances that you would have to be in. That's literally life and death.
Your best chance of survival for you and your family is to leave that country. What do you do? My first trip to Greece on a mission trip to the Salvation Army, who were working with refugees in Athens, hearing stories of why families left. I remember sitting on the stairs in front of the Salvation Army Crisis Center and listening to this 12-year-old boy. Um share about watching his family get blown up.
And having to run from that and going with another family that he didn't even know and being on a boat with them just to survive, and this family like taking him in and taking care of him, or a family in Iran who owned this really popular restaurant and it was like the talk of the town, but then the People in the militia in that town found out that they were a Christian family and started to let them know that if they did not leave, that they would kill them. And having to take their whole family and cross borders and cross the ocean, they had a friend who was in Greece, and this friend said, I will take care of you when you get here. Send me the money, and I will make sure that you have a job and a house waiting for you in Greece when you get there. And then when they arrive, never hearing from that friend again, but having given their whole life savings to this person to take care of them. The mother of that family had gone mute because the trauma was so big for her.
And all she had wanted to do was cook and love on people, and cooking was her passion. And then now she's in another country and she's sharing a small apartment with three other families. There's no running water, no electricity, but yet, The husband is volunteering every day at the Salvation Army to help other people that are in situations just like them, and just trying to show his wife that things will be okay. But his wife has. having not spoken a word in weeks.
That's not somebody that's just out to just live a better life and get more money or take advantage of anyone. It's like a family literally fleeing. Because they have to or else they will die. Just hearing stories of that over and over again has really, really changed my heart and my perspective. Being at the Salvation Army in Sydney, Australia, and our core assistant being from Sierra Leone and having to flee because there was a war there.
And then him having to watch his wife be raped by soldiers in a refugee camp. And yet, here they are in Australia serving in a Salvation Army, and they are the most. Joyful, God-loving people that I know, praising God every day for who God is and how God has protected them.
So I understand why people have misconceptions, but then I now I'm just like, please, please get to know people, just hear their stories, listen to what their circumstances are. I mean, I know that God will change your heart. I think that's an incredibly powerful solution to the problem. Just thinking about it psychologically. We're afraid of things that are foreign to us.
We don't like things that we haven't experienced. There's a guy who... rehabilitates people out of the KKK. And he's a black man. Who rehabilitates people out of the KKK?
And he does that. by getting to know them. And loving on them and building relationships with them and showing them you're afraid of me because of my skin color. But I'm really not all that different from you. You know, we're all human beings.
We all have value and worth. God created all of us. And The solution Is not just to tell people that they're wrong. It's to encourage people to go out and engage with people that make you uncomfortable. Try new things, build new relationships.
I think God calls us to love everyone. And if we're doing that, I think we're naturally going to be inclined towards refugees and those who are struggling. I think also that we don't understand how the system works.
So, in America, you cannot. Come to the country as a refugee unless you've been screened very stringently. There's so many things that you have to go through to be resettled in this country. Obviously, there are those who are undocumented and who are coming over. Again, it's a matter of getting to know people's stories and being compassionate towards them.
And there should be policies in place. There should be to protect a country and to protect people and to make sure that there's a proper process that people go through. Christians, especially, once people have come over, whatever border it is, however they've got here, they now are our neighbor. And God tells us to love our neighbor. and to serve them.
And that's what we should do. We pray that you're enjoying and being blessed by this conversation. Uh We're going to take one more ad break and we'll be right back. I'm Christy Graham, host of the show On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse. And I recently attended an infectious disease training and donned personal protective equipment alongside our staff who are preparing to serve at one of our Ebola treatment centers in the DRC.
Yeah, putting into perspective what our team do. Listen to this behind the scenes episode by searching On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse, wherever you get your podcasts. Again, that's on the ground with Samaritans First. What is the biblical mandate for us to care about refugees, for us to care about people in a mental health crisis, for us to just go into the darkest places of people's lives? And so I had a couple of scriptures I just wanted to share.
And if anyone else has any scriptures that came to mind, or we just discuss how these make us feel. Isaiah 58, starting at verse 6. To loose the chains of injustice and untie the cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free and break every yoke. You skipped ten, and if you spend yourselves on behalf of the hungry and satisfy the needs of the oppressed. then your light will rise in the darkness.
James 127, religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this, to look after orphans and widows in their distress. I mean, all over scripture is asking us to shine our light in the darkness. One of my favorites, First John five, verse three. This is love for God, to obey His commands. His commands are not burdensome.
All of us are looking to build our relationship with God.
So, how do we do that?
Well, in order to love God, we have to obey His commands. And in Matthew twenty two, what does Jesus command us to do? To love your neighbor. As you love yourself.
So to show love for God, we have to show love to our neighbor. That's actually how we experience God and grow in relationship with God is by loving other people. And that starts with loving ourselves, which is a whole nother conversation. Save for later. Yeah.
I have one. It's Isaiah 1:17. It says, To learn to do good, seek justice, correct oppression. Bring justice to the fatherless and plead the widow's cause. I like to bring this to light because It says we have to learn to do it.
It's not an innate thing, even for the people of God. He's just talking to Judah here. But God is very clear in the Bible about How just he is. He is a just God. And I think in the Bible, justice is in there probably over 400 times, I think.
But he does not play about the oppressed, the widow, and the fatherless. And so it is something we have to learn to do. Dear Lord, just thank you that you are the God of the stranger, the foreigner, the sojourner. And Lord, do you have a heart for those who have had to flee their homelands, their places of comfort, where their family and their friends are, who've had to cross borders and cross oceans just to find safety? And Father God, I just pray that you would.
Give us a heart for them too. that we would see them as your image bearers. that we would see them as people who are worthy. of safety I pray, Father God, that you would be with them as they deal with just the trauma of the things that they've had to escape or flee. but then also have to deal with the trauma of finding a new place to stay.
Entering a new country, learning a new language. finding a a job. finding schools. Selling in places that are foreign to them. I pray, Father God, that you would just.
present with them. that you would hold them. That you would comfort them in their times of fear and Sadness and grief. I pray that you would protect them and I pray for opportunities for them in these new places, Lord, that they would find peace. I just pray that we would be people that would Defend them.
That would welcome them, that would show hospitality to them. I pray that we would be people. that listen to them. that be present with them. Embrace them.
And Lord, I just pray that you would constantly just teach us. How to love our neighbor as you would. We pray all these things in your name. Amen. The Salvation Army's mission, doing the most good, means helping people with material and spiritual needs.
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