A biblical promise for refugees

Currently the world is experiencing a refugee crisis and a wave of migration that is being described as the largest since World War II. Heartbreaking reports of overloaded boats with migrants fleeing their home countries, as well as overcrowded refugee camps, have been flooding the news. 

While the current crisis is particularly severe, migration for economic, political, or religious reasons is nothing new. In fact, many of us can trace our family histories back to the migration of ancestors from one country to another.

It would seem that the history of much of humanity is one of displaced citizens and mass migration, instigated by fear of religious persecution, want of greater economic opportunity, or the threat of death. Included in this history are many well-known biblical figures, who at one time or another were refugees. But we find a message of hope in the Bible because its overall record is not one of man’s defeat because of violence, oppression, or limited opportunities, but of man’s triumph over them through a deepening trust in and understanding of God and His divine promise of good for all His children.

In reality God always cares for and protects every one of His beloved children.

Moses, for example, at God’s command, led the children of Israel out of bondage in Egypt. From the very outset, God’s promise to Moses was, “Certainly I will be with thee” (Exodus 3:12 ). Moses and the children of Israel spent forty years in the wilderness, waiting to enter the Promised Land. Even though we could say they were refugees, God, divine Love, sustained them, just as in reality God always cares for and protects every one of His beloved children, each one of us. When the Israelites doubted and murmured, were hungry and thirsty, Moses prayed to God. Quail and manna appeared, and water flowed from rocks—evidence of God’s perpetual, ever-flowing love for His creation and His infinite ability to supply all needs.  

Taken at face value, the Exodus of the children of Israel could be viewed as nothing more than the difficult history of a people wandering around in the wilderness, homeless and desperate. But spiritually viewed, it is the narration of the people’s spiritual growth, of an increasing trust in God’s promises and a deeper understanding of their inseparable relationship to God—of man’s spiritual status as the beloved idea of God. It is a story that shows that right where the material senses present want and woe, lack and hardship, divine Love shines through those lies of material sense and says, “I the Lord thy God will hold thy right hand, saying unto thee, Fear not; I will help thee” (Isaiah 41:13 ). 

Had God’s promises not been kept, the Exodus would have had a very different outcome. More important, there would have been no reason for succeeding generations to trust in, worship, or obey a God who did not fulfill His promises. But God does fulfill His promises, and Moses’ song of deliverance in the 32nd chapter of Deuteronomy testifies to this with these moving words: “The Lord’s portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his inheritance. He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye” (verses 9, 10 ).  

In divine reality, God has never-ending provision and infinite supply for all, and this spiritual truth, when known and cherished, can be proved in human experience. Christ Jesus found himself in the wilderness at times, at one point faced with a hungry crowd of thousands. Through his spiritual understanding of the law of divine Love’s infinite supply, Jesus was able to feed that multitude. Mary Baker Eddy wrote in the Christian Science textbook, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures: “Divine Love always has met and always will meet every human need. It is not well to imagine that Jesus demonstrated the divine power to heal only for a select number or for a limited period of time, since to all mankind and in every hour, divine Love supplies all good” (p. 494 ).   

Science and Health also states, “Your influence for good depends upon the weight you throw into the right scale” (p. 192 ). By prayerfully contending for the spiritual facts about God and His beloved child, and denying the supposed power of an overwhelming crisis, we are putting our mental weight into the right scale, the scale of divine power. An acknowledgment of the spiritual facts in any given situation begins to take the “wind out of the sails” of the limited, material views being manifested as a crisis, allowing good to outweigh evil in human consciousness and experience. 

Prayer impels me to acknowledge the omnipotence and omnipresence of God right where a dead end in human experience seems to be.

This acknowledgment and affirmation of divine law—the law that divine Love is the only power—can overcome despair with hope, replace a sense of doom with promise, and displace a feeling of helplessness with healing. Each individual who throws his weight into the divine scale contributes toward clearing away the mist of doubt, fear, and confusion, thus paving the way for healing and for right answers to come to light. Through the inspired influence of God, divine Mind, intelligent solutions to problems that may have previously seemed too complex or impossible to solve become evident. Opportunities to implement them in practical ways unfold.  

Divine law is always provable as omnipotent and reliable. When praying, I’ve found it helpful to recognize that because the spiritual facts about God’s precious children are true, they are demonstrable facts for all, when understood. Here, I have applied spiritual laws of God to the refugee crisis in particular:

• Because God is divine Principle, I am certain that man’s life as Principle’s reflection must be one of justice, fairness, and equity.
• Because God is eternal Life, man as God’s image and likeness is not subject to death, nor can his supply ever dwindle or run out. Man’s active expression of the spiritual qualities of wholeness, strength, beauty, and joy cannot be quelled, impaired, or stopped.
• Because God is infinite Truth, man as God’s pure likeness expresses only integrity, uprightness, and pure motives. He is the forever innocent idea of Truth, which contains no element of evil. 
• Because God is Love, man is the expression of Love and is precious, cherished, nurtured, and nourished. No one is forsaken or left out of God’s law of goodness, and there is nowhere that this law does not reach and cannot be proved to govern. 
• As the idea of Mind, man understands and perceives his heavenly Father-Mother God tenderly directing, governing, guiding, and sustaining his life. Because God is Mind, man has by reflection wisdom, spiritual intuition, and intelligence. 
• Because God is infinite Soul, man’s being as Soul’s blessed expression includes only infinite supply and unlimited good. Man dwells in Soul, in which there is only order, beauty, grace, harmony, and peace.
• Because God is Spirit, man as the reflection of Spirit is not limited by material circumstances. Man’s heritage is freedom, dominion, wholeness, and safety.

This kind of prayer impels me to acknowledge the omnipotence and omnipresence of God right where a dead end in human experience seems to be. Such prayer brings to light the spiritual facts that dispel gloom and despair, and that enable us to turn obstacles into opportunities to see God’s laws of goodness unfold.

Years before cellphones existed, I was driving and ran out of gas late at night on a desolate and dangerous stretch of road. Turning to God in prayer, understanding the reality of His presence and power, I began to feel at peace. This prayer brought tangible proof of His omnipresent love. 

Soon after I prayed in this way, a pickup truck full of young men stopped and offered me a ride to the gas station. I turned wholeheartedly to my Father-Mother God to know whether this was a wise course of action. I felt it was safe to accept their offer, and off we went. 

They told me on the way that before they picked me up, they were talking about how they couldn’t wait to get home, but that seeing me on the side of the road had made them think about their wives possibly being in the same situation, which led them to stop and help.

Mrs. Eddy states: “As the children of Israel were guided triumphantly through the Red Sea, the dark ebbing and flowing tides of human fear,—as they were led through the wilderness, walking wearily through the great desert of human hopes, and anticipating the promised joy,—so shall the spiritual idea guide all right desires in their passage from sense to Soul, from a material sense of existence to the spiritual, up to the glory prepared for them who love God” (Science and Health, p. 566 ). 

At this time in human history, humanity is finding itself in what may seem a frightening wilderness; but our Father-Mother God, our ever-present source of good, leads us from the material, limited sense of existence to the spiritual—and to a full salvation from all that is limited and harmful. That’s a promise we all can trust and prove wherever we are in the world.