Thoughts Along The Journey

I shared this short biblical meditation with the World Team Global Alliance (WTGA) last week:

We read in Ruth 2:10-11: “Then she fell on her face bowing to the ground, and said to him, “Why have I found favor in your eyes, that you should take notice of me, since I am a foreigner?”  But Boaz answered here, “All that you have done for your mother-in-law since the death of your husband has been fully told to me, and how  you left your father and mother and your native land and came to a people that you did not know before.””

Ruth was invisible to a large part of the world around her.  She was a refuge, an immigrant, a foreigner.  Yet, out of all the workers in his field, Boaz noticed her.  She was not invisible to him.  He moved towards this foreigner and served her in ways that way beyond the cultural norms of the day.

Our world is shifting constantly.  In a recent UN report, it was stated that a record 65.6 million people are either refugees, asylum seekers or internally displaced across the globe. Will these people remain invisible to us?

In a blog post last month titled: What’s In a Name, I wrote: “No one calls her, ‘Ruth’… Ever feel that way in cross cultural ministry?  That somehow your defining quality is not ‘Steve’, ‘Heather’ or ‘Joy’?  That the words more likely to come out of a neighbor’s mouth are: “Oh, you’re looking for the ‘Czech guy’.  He lives two doors down.”  You can begin to feel like a name-less person without roots; a person just ‘passing through’.

Knowing that my identity is solidly anchored in what He says about me, I can move into my world with confidence and courage. I can give all my effort daily to serve the people to whom He has called me because His voice rings in my ears throughout the day: “You are mine!  I have bought you with a price.  No one can snatch you out of my hand.”

It is with that solid assurance that we are not invisible to our God that we can move into this incredible context of displaced people and ‘see’ who He wants us to see and to whom He wants us to minister.

This is our prayer as a WTGA and as WT workers as we move forward in this year.

Filed under: Gospel, Refugee |