Are refugees an invading army of terrorists?

"This is my country now," said Abu Abdullah. "No one can say I am Iraqi. I am an American. If I need to defend my country, even to attack Iraq, I am ready to do that."



A Muslim father buries his son with honor at Arlington

On a recent visit to Nashville, Tennessee, I visited newly arrived refugees from the Middle East.  I was reminded how important it is that Americans understand this situation clearly so that our nation can respond in a way that reflects our national values. There's so much false information being hyped by merchants of fear and politicians desperate for votes.

Rest in Peace, Humayun Khan, American Hero

Najib is a recent immigrant from the northern Iraqi region of Kurdistan. "I'm tired, I've been working ten hours every day, six days every week," he said. "But freedom takes work. If you want the freedom you have to go out there and work for it." He is excited that his children are in school and learning English. He's hoping to bring over many of his brothers and sisters who still live in the war-torn region.



These immigrants are hoping for their children to fit into the new culture. "We want the children to learn English," said Mohammad, who arrived from Baghdad less than a month ago. "It's the language of the world. Arabic is limited." He described the situation in his area of Baghdad as being so bad that one could not safely leave the house.



This facebook meme sums up the anti-Muslim arguments.

"I am looking for work. I am ready to work, I just need help to get my social security card." Ahmad has been in the US less than two months. He is hoping to get work and establish himself so that he can bring over his family. It is normal for the young men to come first, and brings wives, sisters, and parents later.



There are many political pundits decrying the dangers of accepting these Muslim refugees. There are supposed plots to infiltrate America and Europe with terrorist cells who will impose Sharia Law on unsuspecting westerners.


This is the question before us. Are they coming to kill us and then take over? Is this a cloaked Islamic invasion?

Myth#1 They are coming here to Islamize the West.

I spend a lot of time in the homes of Syrian refugees, talking to them about their despair and hopelessness, and also their hopes and dreams.  They hate radical Islam.  They are fleeing from it. One family that I know well fled specifically to keep their children from being radicalized in school. One father described to me his desire to live in any area that is not under the rule of Islam. Instead of flooding to the Islamic State, Muslims are fleeing it by the millions, and their rejection of the Islamic State is a major embarrassment and challenge to the legitimacy of the Islamic State.

The reasons that they are fleeing to the West are not surprising.  UNHCR lists many of the major reasons, including poverty and loss of hope. My Syrian friends often express that they no longer see a future in Syria even if the war ends soon. Whole cities are laid waste.  Families are broken apart by death and division.  Many people are injured both physically and psychologically from the war.


Myth #2 The Islamic State is sending a "secret army" to infiltrate the West

Traveling to join the Islamic State is the example of Abraham

People are spreading this because they are ignorant of the beliefs and practices of the Islamic State. The Islamic State preaches "Hijrah" which is the call of all Muslims to come and live in the Islamic State. It is preached as a religious duty for men and women to move to and live in the Islamic State, just as the early Muslims all flocked to Medina to join the first Islamic State in the days of Mohammad. They devoted an entire edition of their online magazine to describing how important it is to come and live in the Islamic State.  They want the refugees more than the West wants them, but the refugees don't want to live under their oppressive rule. The Islamic State wants you to fear and reject refugees so that they will be forced to return to the domain of the Islamic State. Don't let them manipulate your fear and use you for their evil purpose.

Myth #3 The US will be overrun by chaos like Europe

Europe is not being overrun by chaos, but even if that were the case, it will not happen in the US.  When people use what is happening in Europe to predict what will happen here, they forget something very important: The Atlantic Ocean.  Europe is working to control an immigration situation that is building at their borders.  Refugees who come to the US will do so on an airplane, as part of a tightly controlled process. The Muslim population in the US is less than 1%, and taking on an additional 200,000 refugees will raise it to -still less than 1%.  Muslims are dispersed throughout the US population and have shown very little tendency to form enclaves.

These men are not imposing Judaism on anyone

Myth #4 They will establish Sharia Law

The Constitution does not allow any religious law to be imposed on people.  If Muslim immigrants want to live under Sharia court ruling, they can do what numbers of Jewish and Catholic citizens already do -voluntary arbitration.  It's not legally binding unless both parties agree for it to be so.  Are there any areas in the US where citizens are forced to live under Jewish of Catholic law? Again, most of them have no desire to live under Sharia Law anyway, and the ones who do cannot ever force it on anyone else.

Myth #5 They will stay on welfare

Muslim Americans are middle class and main stream. They are well educated, well integrated into society, and at least as affluent as the national average.  This is especially true of immigrant Muslims.  Poor Muslims are often converts from the spread of Islam among poor, black Americans in prison populations.

Myth #6 We should send them back

This is an evil idea. Sending refugees back into a war zone is wicked.  We look back now in horror at the stories of Jewish refugees who were turned away.  We recoil at the idea that ships had to return Jews to their deaths because no one wanted them, or trusted them.  The voices of fear and bigotry caused our nation, and others, to commit an evil act.  We must not listen to those voices again.  We must rebuke them.  For the people fleeing the Islamic State, ad the butchery of the Assad regime, this is life and death.

A "Flypaper" Ministry

I had a fantastic experience last night at "Best of the Blessed," an annual fundraiser for the Christian Women's Job Corps of Guntersville.  I've attended it every year since it began, and this year my dear brother Mark Brickey was kind enough to invite me to join him at a table sponsored by Sand Mountain Toyota.  The event was hosted by the Church at Lake Guntersville, which has been blessed to do this each year.

If you've never been to this event, make sure you get a ticket next year.  If you're a married man, it makes a fantastic date for your wife -unless your wife is like mine and insists on working.  Of course, having such a wife is a great blessing itself.

 The food was good, as it always has been.  This year they raised the bar by serving on real China, though the settings have always been classy.  The musical talent was diverse and entertaining.  A group from Sweet Home Baptist did a fine job opening, followed by the Church of Christ Chorale -a very talented group.  The First Baptist Pickers did a set of songs that reminded me of my younger days in an old Country Church.

The man whole really set the bar, though, was Zac Hicks.  The boy has talent.  He played acoustical guitar, but used a looping box that allowed him to accompany himself in an ever growing arrangement that ended in a crescendo of sound.  He was literally a one man band, and a very good one.  He even managed to make "Old MacDonald" sound good in an impromptu composition.


She is clothed with strength and dignity; she can laugh at the days to come.
She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.
She watches over the affairs of her household and does not eat the bread of idleness.
Her children arise and call her blessed; her husband also, and he praises her:
“Many women do noble things, but you surpass them all.”
Charm is deceptive, and beauty is fleeting; but a woman who fears the LORD is to be praised.
Honor her for all that her hands have done, and let her works bring her praise at the city gate.

Nothing, however, compared to the main event.  Two of the ladies gave their testimonies about how CWJC had "lifted their heads."  Every year we get to hear about the powerful work of the Holy Spirit in this ministry.  Women turn their backs on lives of poverty, drug abuse, crime, abuse, and a whole host of evils.  They choose to follow Jesus Christ and be changed by him.  The two ladies this year both told of how God had brought them out of sin and broken homes, and restored their families.

I had a chance to meet one of the ladies who graduated several years ago when I first served on the Board of Directors.  She and her husband, both strong believers in Jesus, were led by the Lord to sponsor a table for $1,000.  She is now serving as a leader and mentor to other women through CWJC.  Truly God has lifted her up and made her a woman of strength and character.

Someone asked me what keeps drawing people to CWJC, and I answered that the ministry is like flypaper.  Once you touch it you're stuck, there's no getting away.  The work of the Holy Spirit, when it is obvious like this, is not something you can walk away from.  I'm already thinking ahead to a group of women coming to Beirut to set up the first CWJC in Lebanon.  Wouldn't that be great?

My hat is off to Site Coordinator Shelia Banks, who is stealing all the crowns in Glory, and to the many volunteers and leaders who serve in CWJC.  Brenda Hicks has been as blessing there, as she is with everything she touches.  Thank you all for your obedience.

Travel light, Christian

[Jesus] sent them out to preach the kingdom of God and to heal the sick. He told them: “Take nothing for the journey—no staff, no bag, no bread, no money, no extra tunic." (Luke 9:2-5)

 What an odd set of instructions for Jesus to give his 12 disciples as he sent them out to spread the Gospel.  He could have told them not to pack a bunch of junk, but this was even more emphatic.  "Take nothing," he said.  Naturally I did a word study on this to better understand it, and "take nothing" actually means "take nothing."  Having failed to dilute this seemingly strange commandment to the 12, I now have to try to understand why such a bold instruction was made.

This is the same Jesus who said "But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well."  He was referring to our needs such as food and clothing.  If I need a staff, I'll find one.  I don't need a bag, because it is used to carry things I don't need.  I don't need to carry extra money, God will provide what I need as the need arises.  I don't need an extra tunic, I can clean this one as I go.

Several years ago I had the pleasure of meeting Mike Johnson, who was then Pastor of First Baptist Church in Albertville.  He has since moved on to Boone's Chapel, and the great folks at FBC have another fantastic Pastor, Chris Johnson (oddly, no relation).  FBC Albertville one of the largest congregations in our County.

As Pastor of FBC Albertville,  Mike Johnson lived in a trailer.  Now, it was a nice trailer, but nonetheless his home was brought in on wheels.  It wasn't a salary issue.  Mike is also a successful business man and could have afforded to live in just about any house in town.

Mike chose to live in a trailer, he said, so that if God called him to do so, he could follow right then.

That hit me like a ton of bricks because I am in exactly the opposite situation.  My wife and I own a large poultry farm, a fairly large home, and a mortgage to go with the whole thing.  My chicken contract and mortgage contract are obligations that I must in good faith keep.  While we've never lived extravagantly, we are definitely tied down to the farm.  I should not be.

As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. “Come, follow me,” Jesus said, “and I will make you fishers of men.”  At once they left their nets and followed him.

Did you read that, fellow Christian?  "At once" they left their nets.  It was two years ago when Kim and I agreed on God's call in our lives, to go to Lebanon.  Unfortunately, we have a mortgage on our nets, and as the Bible says "the borrower is servant to the lender."  I have to sell my boat and my nets to pay off my mortgage.  I've compared selling a chicken farm to wrestling an octopus.  When you pry a few tentacles off, there's always another one to grab you.

The problem is not what we have, it's whether it has us.  Mike Johnson is not a poor man, but he is a man who is ready to follow God's calling "at once."  I want to be like that.  This has been a painful lesson in some ways, knowing I should be doing something else, but being unable to do it "at once."  I know that God will work out the timing according to his will, but I haven't worked out my part according to his will.

No more debt, or contract entanglements, will keep me from being able to follow God's will in my life.  This is my last round wrestling the octopus.

A Tale of Two Kingdoms

Leviticus 19:33  Don't mistreat any foreigners who live in your land.  Instead, treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember, you were once foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God. 

So often we forget the simple lessons of God's Word, and get caught up in our own idea of wisdom.  Such is the case with the way the people of Alabama, and our government, are treating illegal aliens.  In order to understand the application of this part of God's Law, we must first understand the principle of Two Kingdoms.

John 18:36  Jesus answered, My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence.

The central message of Jesus was the Kingdom of God.  Many of his most famous parables begin with "The Kingdom of God is like..."  Yet, no matter how much he preached and taught about the Kingdom of God, he couldn't get people to let go of the kingdom of this world.  There's a reason that the kingdom of this world is so alluring, so powerful.  It is the kingdom of Satan himself.

1 John 5:19  We are certain that we come from God and that the rest of the world is under the power of the devil.

But Jesus came to rescue us from the "Prince of this World".  He came to show us a better Kingdom, a kingdom based on his Laws, not the laws of man.  As we live in this world, there will always be a tension between the Law of God and the law of man.

John 12:31  Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out.  And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself.

So, where does our allegiance lie?  When those Kingdoms collide, how does a believer respond to that?  We cannot expect the government to respond in a Christ-like manner, but shouldn't that be our response as believers in the Lord Jesus Christ, citizens of his Kingdom?  He bought our citizenship with his own blood.  Why, then, do so many Christians put their allegiance in the law of man?

Leviticus 19:33  Don't mistreat any foreigners who live in your land.  Instead, treat them as well as you treat citizens and love them as much as you love yourself. Remember, you were once foreigners in the land of Egypt. I am the LORD your God.

God's Kingdom knows no boundaries of citizenship or nation.  Lines drawn on the ground by men can never be the basis for how we respond to those in need.  In the parable of the Good Samaritan, we are taught that our neighbor is the person we find in need.  We are to love that person without regard to legal documentation.  They are to be treated just as we treat citizens.  Any other response is disobedience to God's Law.

If you, Christian, spend more time worrying about deporting illegal immigrants than you spend sharing the Gospel with immigrants, loving them as yourself, to which Kingdom do you belong?

Sucessful Evangelism

Tomorrow (Monday) I'm heading down to Birmingham with Pastor(s) Keith and Kenny to meet with Pastor John Constantine about a joint effort by our Churches to minister to Iraqi refugees. In praying about and planning for this meeting, I've been thinking a lot about what constitutes legitimate and “successful” mission efforts. Over the years I've had the opportunity to attend many meetings about missions and ministry. Among Baptists, for the most part, the success of a mission is measured by how many people were saved. Numbers are often thrown out as proof of success.

Now, don't get me wrong on this, I love seeing people get saved. There's really nothing better than seeing a dead person get a new lease on life. Yet, I can't help thinking that we as Baptists suffer from a fundamental misunderstanding of how people get saved. Because of this, we are reaching out in ways that are not producing the sort of kingdom fruit that God desires.

The teaching of the scriptures about what we are to do as Christians does not focus on people being saved. Consider one of the scriptures that is a favorite among those of us who are mission-minded Baptists, the Great Commission:

Therefore, as you go, disciple all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey all that I have commanded you.

We are given a single task here, broken into two elements. The single task is to make disciples. We accomplish that by doing two things. We baptize disciples, and we teach them. Nowhere here is there a mention of saving them, or even of leading them to salvation. Yet we understand, of course, that people cannot be baptized and taught as disciples unless they are saved.

Jesus made it clear that he alone offers salvation.

I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

We cannot baptize or teach those who do not claim the name of Jesus. No amount of teaching them how to behave in Church will save them. Merely “Christianizing” people is not enough. The most we can accomplish is changing their behavior, which has no bearing on their eternal relationship with the living God.

Jesus made it clear that he alone does the saving:

On this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of Hell shall not withstand it.

He will build his Church. He didn't ask us to build it, nor should we. Any Church I build is destined to be as screwed up as its founder, or worse.

We must leave salvation to the work of the Holy Spirit, because we are unworthy to save. It should not be manipulated, coerced, or otherwise “helped”. The very idea that we can arrange matters so that more or fewer people are saved is arrogant, and an attempt on our part to play God.

Charles Finney is to blame for the modern invitation system, and much of the poor theology that goes along with it. In addition to being a Pelagian heretic, he pioneered the use of altar calls, high-pressure preaching, and emotional appeals. The idea of scoring a large number of converts with slick packaging at an event is a recent concept with no roots in historical Christianity. It's a marketing technique rooted in modern thinking, and its legacy drives missionary efforts worldwide. When we do see large numbers of people converted, as happened at Pentecost, it is with a simple preaching of the Word during a move of the Holy Spirit.

The Gospel of Finney would equip missionaries with the following instructions:

Go out and organize large evangelistic gatherings, draw as many people as you possibly can to the event. Preach an emotionally charged message, and deliver it with great fervor. Use dramas, music, or anything you can to appeal to people's emotions -guilt, anxiety, fear.

If people aren't responding, turn up the volume. Preach harder, sing one more verse of the invitation song and make an especially strong emotional appeal. Plead, cry, beg, threaten -do whatever it takes to get them to come forward and make a decision. Plant a few people in the audience who will pretend to respond, to serve as a catalyst.

When Jesus sent out his first missionary team, he gave them these instructions:

As you go, proclaim, 'The kingdom of heaven is near! Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, drive out demons. Without payment you have received; without payment you are to give. Don't take any gold, silver, or copper in your moneybags, or a traveling bag for the trip, or an extra shirt, or sandals, or a walking stick. For a worker deserves his food.

Whatever town or village you enter, find out who is worthy in it and stay there until you leave. As you enter the house, greet it. If the house is receptive, let your blessing of peace come on it. But if it isn't receptive, let your blessing of peace return to you. If no one welcomes you or listens to your words, as you leave that house or town, shake its dust off your feet.

More to the point, Jesus told us:

In the same way, let your light shine before people in such a way that they will see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven."

If we want to know what missions and ministry should look like, we need look no further than the words of our Lord and Savior:

When the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels are with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. All the nations will be assembled in front of him, and he will separate them from each other as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will put the sheep on his right but the goats on his left.

Then the king will say to those on his right, 'Come, you who have been blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger, and you welcomed me. I was naked, and you clothed me. I was sick, and you took care of me. I was in prison, and you visited me.'

This is nothing like the one-shot evangelism practiced by so many today. Churches and ministries move in for a short term effort, and look for ways to manipulate people to maximize the results of their work -a work which is not theirs in the first place.

We live in an industrial age, and view everything in the lens of mass production. We look for a more efficient process to produce greater results. Applying this to ministry and evangelism may produce more decisions, but does it produce more disciples? More to the point, does it follow in obedience to God?