LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2013, Page 365

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THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS­­—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS
immigration enforcement today.25 Christians should not use the Old Testament, however, to argue for love of the immigrant in ways that diminish the
significance of the rule of law as it functions in nation-states today. Similarly,
Christians must be cautious about using particular distinctions between Israel
and aliens made in the Old Testament to advocate for particular forms of
immigration law or law enforcement today, or to argue that such ancient biblical distinctions can or must be replicated in terms of the relationship between
citizens and foreign nationals in contemporary nation-states.
How then should the Scriptures inform our attitude towards immigrants
today? The biblical data invites us to see immigrants as our neighbors. Scripture tells us what motivates Israel’s love for its immigrant neighbor, and what
such love concretely entails at this or that time in the history of God’s people.
For instance, the people of God are to love the alien because they, too, were
aliens in Egypt (Ex. 22:21, 23:9, Lev. 19:34, Dt. 10:19, 24:17-22) and thus truly
“know the heart of a sojourner” in a way that should naturally lead to compassion for him or her (Ex. 23:9). Above all, the people of God are to love the alien
because this is the will of the Lord, who loves, provides for, watches over,
and hears in heaven the cry of the alien (Ps. 146:9, Dt. 24:15). God’s command
to Israel to love the sojourners “as yourself” may also be seen as a divine call
to practice justice towards those who are often the victims of oppression and
wrongdoing, or evil schemes (Lev. 19:33-34, Jer. 7:5-7, Zec. 7:8-10).
Such love for the alien becomes concrete, among other things, by attending to basic needs for food and clothing (Dt. 10:18-19), showing fairness in
dealings with workers’ wages (Dt. 24:14-15, Mal. 3:5), and being generous with
one’s abundance (Dt. 24:19-22). Those in Israel who are tempted not to follow
God’s command to love the alien neighbor “as yourself” are warned not “to
25
This is the general thrust of James K. Hoffmeier, The Immigration Crisis, where the author
uses Old Testament data to argue for a regulated border today. The claim is advanced by the argument that the only sense of the Old Testament noun ger “corresponds to a legal alien today,”
and therefore must be distinguished from the meaning of the term “foreigner” (nekhar and zar)
which would arguably correspond today to “an illegal immigrant” (p. 156, cf. p. 57); Carroll,
however, has taken Hoffmeier to task for “adding” to his study of the lexical use of ger “an
element, which I believe is impossible to prove,” namely, that ger “‘was a person who entered
Israel and followed legal procedures to obtain recognized standing as a resident alien’ (p. 52, emphasis mine).” Carroll argues that, while this may be true in some cases, Hoffmeier’s absolute claim
says more than the biblical data allows one to hold: “The Law never mentions some sort of legal
entry requirement. What is expected is that these individuals obey the laws and participate in
the religious life of Israel; in turn, the Law was generous to them.” Moreover, Carroll points
to the case of Ruth whose “entry and assimilation process” into the community of Israel “does
not deal at all with ‘legal procedures’” but rather with “cultural ones” (cf. chapters 1 and 4),
and to Jacob’s purchase of land in Shechem (Gen. 33) as an instance where no explicit mention
is made in the text of legal permission of entry into the land prior to purchase—an assumption
made by Hoffmeier—but “only that he bought property after moving into the region” (Gen.
33:18-20). Carroll concludes his critique of Hoffmeier by stating that “the verb gwr [ger] has
the broad term meaning ‘to reside,’ irrespective of legal standing (e.g., Judg. 5:17; Ps. 15:1; Jer.
49:18, 33; 50:4).” See M. Daniel Carroll R., Review of James K. Hoffmeier, “The Immigration
Crisis: Immigrants, Aliens, and the Bible,” The Denver Journal: An Online Review of Current Biblical and Theological Studies 13 (January 2010). Online: http://www.denverseminary.edu/article/
the-immigration-crisis-immigrants-aliens-and-the-bible/.

pervert the justice due the sojourner” lest they become “guilty of sin” (Dt.
24:15, 17) and the objects of “swift witness against…those who thrust aside
the sojourner” (Mal. 3:5). God’s concern for the well-being of aliens is typically
placed alongside His compassion for the widow, the fatherless, and the poor
(Dt. 10:18, 24:17, 19-21, Ps. 146:9, Jer. 7:6, Zec. 7:10, Mal. 3:5). Aliens in the midst
of Israel are thus seen as neighbors who, for the most part, are among the most
vulnerable and disadvantaged members of society.
The New Testament assumes the Old Testament’s command to love
our neighbors as ourselves, whoever they are. But the New Testament also
assumes the Old Testament’s witness to Yahweh’s compassion for the stranger
in our Lord Jesus Christ’s own self-identification with the stranger and in
His reaching out to those outside of the house of Israel during His ministry,
whether or not they are foreigners. In the final judgment scene, the Son of Man
welcomes into His Father’s kingdom those who have reached out to Him by
helping “one of the least of these.” Our Lord desires to identify Himself with
the stranger so that we might see Him in the stranger: “For I was hungry and
you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and
you welcomed me” (Matthew 25:35, italics added). Notwithstanding the various interpretations of the identity of “one of the least of these” in Matthew
25,26 Martin Luther uses the text in his explanation of the fifth commandment
in his Large Catechism to identify Christ with “those in need and peril of body
and life.”27 While the biblical teaching can function specifically as a warning
against the rejection of the disciples (“one of the least of these my brothers”)
and therefore of the Lord who sent them into the world,28 such teaching has
also functioned more broadly in Lutheran catechesis to promote God’s command to look after the neighbor’s well-being. In either case, the biblical and
catechetical teachings assume the Old Testament’s broader and more fundamental affirmation of the virtue of welcoming the stranger in our midst.
Our Lord’s compassion for the stranger, for those outside of the house of
Israel, which is evident in His ministry, is consistent with Yahweh’s concern
for the strangers around and among the people of Israel. In the Old Testa26
“Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers, you did it to me”
(Matthew 25:40, cf. 45). For the diversity of interpretive options on this point, see W. D. Davies
and Dale C. Allison, The Gospel According to Saint Matthew, vol. 3 (Edinburgh: T & T Clark, 1997),
428-30, cf. 421-23.
27
“Therefore God rightly calls all persons murderers who do not offer counsel or assistance
to those in need and peril of body and life. He will pass a most terrible sentence upon them
at the Last Day, as Christ himself says. He will say: ‘I was hungry and you gave me no food, I
was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me,
naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ That is to
say, ‘You would have permitted me and my family to die of hunger, thirst, and cold, to be torn
to pieces by wild beasts, to rot in prison or perish from want.’” The Large Catechism (LC), Ten
Commandments, 191, in Robert Kolb and Timothy Wengert, ed. [abbreviated as KW], The Book
of Concord: The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2000), 412.
28
See Jeffrey A. Gibbs, Jerusalem and Parousia: Jesus’ Eschatological Discourse in Matthew’s Gospel
(St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2000).

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ment, such concern for the sojourners includes not only the call for justice on
their behalf but also the desire to bring them into the house of Israel to share
in the spiritual blessings accorded to the children of God.29 Similarly, our Lord
reaches out with His mercy to the demon-possessed daughter of a Canaanite
or Syrophoenician woman (Mt. 15:21-28, Mk. 7:24-30), making these Gentiles
participants in the blessings of His Father’s kingdom. Jesus praises the faith
of the Canaanite woman, affirming implicitly that Gentiles too are spiritually hungry, can put their trust in the Son whom God has sent, and are able
to become children of God the Father. Moreover, Jesus meets the Gentile’s
daughter’s physical need by delivering her from bondage to Satan. He reaches
out to strangers in their spiritual and bodily needs.

Christians’ concern for the needy neighbor extended beyond the confines of
the community of faith. Calling the church in Galatia to “do good to everyone,” the apostle teaches that the church serves “especially” though not
exclusively “those who are of the household of faith” (Gal. 6:10). The apostle
instructs the Christian church in Rome to “contribute to the needs of the saints
and seek to show hospitality [to strangers]” (Rom. 12:13). These apostolic
exhortations to the Christian churches to show hospitality to all strangers
mirror and are consistent with Yahweh’s own command to Israel to reflect His
love for the strangers.

Our Lord’s compassion for those considered to be outside of the house
of Israel also becomes evident in His encounter with a Samaritan woman
(Jn. 4:3-42), whom He makes by promise an heir of “the gift of God” and
“living water” (references to the gift of the Spirit who comes from the Son, cf.
Jn. 7:37-39). The extent of our Lord’s compassion for a Samaritan—despised
by Jews—teaches us that the gift of the Spirit, access to God through worship
“in spirit and truth,” and the privilege to become a witness to the Messiah are
available even to strangers outside of the house of Israel and, through their
witness, to their towns or communities. In Jesus’ ministry of proclamation and
healing, therefore, we see the continuation of Yahweh’s concern for the strangers, attending to their temporal (bodily) and spiritual needs and extending His
mercy to their family members and communities.30
The Old Testament’s witness to Yahweh’s compassion for the stranger
also comes through in St. Paul’s apostolic teaching on hospitality.31 The early
29
Even though Carroll and Hoffmeier differ significantly in their approaches to reading the
Old Testament data on sojourners, they both speak of the possibility of aliens participating in
the spiritual blessings of the people of Israel in accordance with the Old Testament. Hoffmeier,
however, argues that such spiritual participation was contingent upon their prior acceptance
as “legal immigrants” in the land. See Hoffmeier, The Immigration Crisis, 89-96; Carroll sees
Hoffmeier’s view, based on a narrow interpretation of ger as referring exclusively to “legal”
aliens, as problematic when applied in an absolute manner (see his critique of Hoffmeier in n.
25 above). Notwithstanding these readings of the Old Testament data, it remains still problematic in the New Testament era to argue that for immigrants to participate in the blessings of the
church or spiritual Israel in the U.S. today, they must first become legal residents or citizens of
the temporal nation-state. The New Testament places no such temporal conditions for becoming children of God through faith in Christ.
30
We recognize, of course, that our Lord also gives a certain priority to the household of Israel
(Mt 15:24) and the biblical dictum that concern for the well-being of others must always begin
with those whom God has placed nearest to us in our earthly lives (Mark 7:10-12; Gal 6:10).
31
For a contemporary attempt at describing the moral life using the biblical value of hospitality to the stranger as an “overarching metaphor,” see Thomas W. Ogletree, Hospitality to the
Stranger: Dimensions of Moral Understanding (Louisville: Westminster/John Knox, 2003). Drawing in part from Resident Aliens by Stanley Hauerwas and William H. Willimon (Nashville:
Abingdon, 1989), Castelo argues that many Hispanics in the U.S. qualify as “aliens twice-over,”
both as Christians in a land hostile to the Gospel and as illegal aliens in the political realm. This
reality is a constant reminder to the church of her duty to discern critically what it means to be
a Christian in an alien land. This implies in part the duty of Christians both to discern whether

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To sum up, we must acknowledge that, while the prophetic and apostolic
Scriptures give ample evidence of Yahweh’s will for His people to love the
strangers and aliens by attending to their bodily and spiritual needs, the Scriptures do not speak directly to questions about how the church today should
think about or deal with contemporary immigration law in general or “illegal
immigration” in particular. Scriptural teaching on immigrants, therefore,
cannot be directly translated into current immigration laws or policies.
While the Scriptures do not provide “proof-texts” that give simple or
direct answers to all the various legal and political questions about immigration issues today, they do provide an interpretive framework that helps us to
reflect on and address such questions. Moreover, we dare not minimize the
biblical evidence presented thus far concerning God’s call for the church to
reflect in her life His own love for the strangers in her midst. This cannot be
seen merely as a culturally bound concern, but must be viewed more concretely as God’s will and command for His people at all times and in all places.
We are bound by Scripture to love our neighbor, including the immigrant in
our midst. Therefore, even as Christians struggle to address legal and political questions on the narrow issue of legality, the broad and consistent biblical
teaching on God’s love for the aliens who live and move amidst His people
must be taken with utmost seriousness.
Otherwise stated, Scripture offers us a consensus on basic values that, as
a point of departure, should inform the attitudes of God’s people towards all
immigrants or aliens regardless of their status in society. Although immigrants
did not always share in the same temporal and spiritual blessings as God’s
people in the Old Testament, the divine command to love the alien as our
neighbor remains valid and is not fundamentally tied to the fulfillment of any
specific obligations on the part of the alien. This suggests that legal or illegal
status cannot be a prerequisite for the church’s concern about the basic dignity
of aliens and their families as God’s creatures, or for their need for food and
clothing and a fuller life for their families, their fair and just treatment in society, and their need to hear the Gospel and receive the sacraments.

civil laws and political entities of the day promote a just state of affairs and to extend hospitality to strangers. See Daniel Castelo, “Resident and Illegal Aliens,” Apuntes: Reflexiones teológicas
desde el margen hispano 23/2 (Summer 2003): 65-77.

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2013 Convention Workbook