Postponing Love in an Airport

By Kristen Pope

I don’t think it is helpful for us to fault one another for our fears.

On the first day that refugees began arriving at Crescent Hill Baptist Church in Louisville, Ky., my home church at the time, I was afraid. I was afraid because I was a high-schooler who liked things the way they were, and everything was changing. I was afraid because it was uncomfortable to hear words in the hallways that I could not understand. I was afraid because for the first time in my life, I might be the minority in a room, if only for a moment. I was afraid because I began to be exposed to stories of the life of a refugee, stories that no one should have to live and yet the people sitting in the pews next to me had, and continued to in many ways.

I don’t fault myself for those fears, misplaced though they may have been.

Following Jesus does not mean that we will never be afraid, and if we expect that it should make us fearless we will be disappointed in ourselves more often than not. Jesus’ disciples were terrified when he was imprisoned and crucified, and I doubt many of us would fault them for that. What is important about my fear years ago is that my community of faith pushed me to challenge my fear, and introduced me to a beautifully diverse family of God where I encountered Christ in countless languages, cultures, experiences and countries. It was a glimpse of the kingdom that sent me running to seminary to figure out how I could bring this family of God elsewhere.

I could quote Bible verses that instruct us to care for the stranger, the foreigner, the sojourner in our midst. But I would venture to say that it is in many cases not a lack of education about what the Bible says about loving the other that is holding us back from welcoming our refugee brothers and sisters. It is our fear. Fear of the unknown, fear of danger, fear of being uncomfortable, fear of widening our circles, fear of really needing to show up and the be the people, be the church, that God calls us to be.

I am not original here in my plea to the church, nor do I think I am asking anything less than what is required of us by God. We tell our children in Sunday School that it is important to love everyone, even when it costs us something to do so. We tell them to sit with the kids in the cafeteria who usually sit by themselves, to befriend them and make sure they do not feel alone, because they are loved by God and by us. To bring that story to adults in the church, we are called to sit with the people who are alone, people who are scared and hurting and in need. We are called to sit with refugees in the cafeteria, in the airport, in our homes, in our pews.

It is okay to be afraid. We could and should talk about the basis of those fears and the stereotypes that likely lie beneath them, but it is okay to be afraid to be what God is calling us to be. It is not okay to let that fear allow us to leave the refugee who is sitting alone. The refugee is afraid, and let me assure you that they have very real reason to be. They are made in the image of God every bit as much as you and me, and there can be no question that our calling as Christians must be to love them as fiercely as we do our own family. We cannot postpone that love. We cannot wait until that love seems safe. We cannot detain that love in an airport until it sits well with us, and we must not silence that love so that our fear can take control.

Christ compels us to make our faith bigger than our fear, and that means asking of ourselves and our churches that we open our arms wider, raise our voices louder and love harder as we welcome our refugee friends from every place around God’s world.

Kristen Pope is a student pursuing her Master of Divinity at McAfee School of Theology at Mercer University. She serves as a ministry intern at Smoke Rise Baptist Church in Tucker, Ga. 

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