“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free. The wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me. I lift my lamp beside the golden door!”  From the inscription on the Statue of Liberty.

Sometimes in my reading, I happen across a verse and just sense the Lord saying, “Stop. Take a look at this.” This was one of those mornings.

And I knew immediately I had to write about it.

In Ezekiel 47, God has just very specifically laid out the border for the Nation of Israel, tribe by tribe. The borders He outlined for each tribe were clear and precise. Exact borders to the North, South, East and West. Everyone would know without question the boundaries of their land. And He gave them legal right to it. This was their inheritance. Ideally this would prohibit any future land wars among the people.

But what to do about the foreigners?

God knows the human heart. So He’s equally clear about how to handle immigrants.

“You are to distribute this land among yourselves according to the tribes of Israel. You are to allot it as an inheritance for yourselves and for the foreigners who have settled among you and who have children. You are to consider them as native-born Israelites; along with you they are to be allotted an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. In whatever tribe the foreigner settles, there you are to give him his inheritance,” declares the Sovereign Lord.” Ezekiel 47:21-23

Our temptation is to say, “But this is our country, our land. We’ve got to protect it from outsiders.” But it’s not the heart of God. God knew that Israel would struggle with the same kind of thinking, so He makes it abundantly clear what to do with foreigners.

• Allot to them the land where they settle 
• Treat them as native born Israelites.
• This will be their inheritance for future generations (the reason for “…who have children.)

In other words, God gave them a legal right to the land. They didn’t have to buy it, or go to war for it. It was their inheritance. And God was making sure their future generations would legally own the land as well.

Simply because they settled there.

This is such a beautiful example of the mercy and grace of God, the very Gospel itself. Paul reminds us in Ephesians 2:11-13, “Remember that formerly you who are Gentiles by birth…that at that time you were separate from Christ, excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of the promise, without hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far away have been brought near through the blood of Christ.” (NIV)

Once, we were all foreigners to God, excluded from citizenship in the Kingdom of Heaven. But God in His mercy redeemed us through Christ and gave us an inheritance. In other words, we didn’t pay for it. Jesus did.

“Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ! In his great mercy he has given us new birth into a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead, and into an inheritance that can never perish, spoil or fade — kept in heaven for you.” 1 Peter 1:3-4 (NIV)

Let’s also remember, unless Native-American born, all of our ancestors were foreigners. Whether a family moving to a new world in hopes of providing a better future for their children’s children, or cruelly forced here by the horrors of slavery. 

We were all foreigners. 

Any time the revealed heart of God runs counter to my existing narrative, belief system, or political ideology. It’s probably a good time to re-evaluate my narrative.

May the inscription on the Statue of Liberty, Ezekiel 47:21-23, and the Gospel of Jesus Christ shape our narrative about borders (and foreigners) that aligns with the heart of God.

Photo by AussieActive on Unsplash