Ruth and Refugees: Biblical Guidance for Christians

Reflections

There are several themes in the book of Ruth that can be tied common problems that refugees experience. As Christians, how do we respond as we encounter refugees in our neighborhoods? The Bible gives us lots of help in this area!

In the first chapter of Ruth, Naomi and Elimelek left Judah because of the famine. As they entered Moab, they could be considered refugees. Then when Naomi’s husband and children die, she is left as a widow in a refugee situation, which is not a good place to be. Naomi decided to head home, but she is heading to a home without immediate family or a male provider. All she has is a daughter-in-law of foreign nationality who is choosing to embrace Naomi’s God and is pledging to stay with Naomi and care for her.

As Naomi and Ruth enter Judah, their situation is somewhat similar to the plight of the modern day refugee. They do end up having a relative close enough to be a kinsman redeemer, but apparently it isn’t a close enough relationship to be of immediate assistance. In the second chapter, Ruth initially sees gleaning the fields as her only option of survival.

When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not wholly reap the corners of your field, neither shall you gather the gleanings of your harvest. You shall not glean your vineyard, neither shall you gather the fallen grapes of your vineyard. You shall leave them for the poor and for the foreigner. I am Yahweh your God.
Leviticus 19:9-10 (WEB)

With the recent Afghan and Ukrainian crises, the problems that refugees face have been much more apparent to the average American. How can the Christian church help? An obvious answer is to provide jobs to anyone willing to work. There are going to be language barriers, skill barriers, and psychological barriers, but this should not stop us from helping.

The second is like this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Mark 12:31 (WEB)

Jesus tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves. If we were forced into leaving our homes, we would want someone to come alongside us and help us regain a place of belonging into a community. God actually commands the Israelites to love the refugees and foreigners in Deuteronomy:

Therefore love the foreigner, for you were foreigners in the land of Egypt.
Deuteronomy 10:19 (WEB)

Love encompasses many things. We should be willing to teach the refugees English, provide them with opportunities to learn a skill, connect them with jobs that match that skill, and help them deal with the emotional baggage that comes from having to leave home under desperate circumstances.

If you can’t quite bring yourself to show real love, the minimum bar is that you should not mistreat or oppress the foreigner (or alien). There are several places in Exodus that deal with this topic.

You shall not wrong an alien or oppress him, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt.
Exodus 22:21 (WEB)

And if someone does decide to mistreat or oppress a foreigner or refugee, God commanded the Israelites to take legal action and demand justice.

Cursed is he who withholds justice from the foreigner, fatherless, and widow.
Deuteronomy 27:19 (WEB)

Most important to the plight of Ruth and Naomi, God commands the Israelites to be fair to foreign workers. As refugees come into our country, we need to be sure that we are paying them a fair wage and treating them the way we would treat any other employee.

You shall not oppress a hired servant who is poor and needy, whether he is one of your brothers or one of the foreigners who are in your land within your gates.
Deuteronomy 24:14 (WEB)

Ruth really isn’t a hired worker, but in the second chapter of Ruth, Boaz seems take a lot of these verses to heart and shows love and compassion to the plight of Ruth and Naomi. Eventually, Boaz realizes he has an even deeper connection to Ruth and that he is one of Ruth’s closest relatives and a kinsman redeemer.

If your brother becomes poor, and sells some of his possessions, then his kinsman who is next to him shall come, and redeem that which his brother has sold.
Leviticus 25:25 (WEB)

This is where the refugee parallel could fall apart, but once you consider being brothers in Christ, there are plenty of refugees that you could choose to help based on this relationship in Christ.

Regardless of whether the refugees that we interact with are Christians or not, the Bible makes it clear that we have some responsibility towards them. We are to love the refugee, treat the refugee fairly, and demand justice when someone wrongs them.

I love the fact that many Christian churches stepped in to help the Afghan refugee, even though most of us are of a different faith.

From a USA perspective, the United States chose to get involved with keeping peace in Afghanistan. When we decided to pull out, we completely bungled the job and many Afghan citizens were left in a terrible place. If nothing else, citizens of the United States have a responsibility to make things right for the people who were forced to flee.

From a Christian perspective, I think we are called by God to love the foreigner. Since a lot of Afghan citizens are being brought into the United States, we should evaluate both our civic responsibility and our Christian responsibility to help where we can.

When looking at the Ukrainian refugees, there is not the problem of our government messing things up for them, but they are still foreigners in our land and we are called to love them. In addition, many of them are our brothers and sisters in Christ. Whenever this is the case, we have a double responsibility to help and could even consider ourselves a kinsman redeemer for some of the Christian refugees.

As you interact with the foreigner and refugee in your neighborhood, weigh these factors and consider what you can do to become part of the solution.

For me, I love education and have decided to provide one-on-one ESL language support to adult immigrants and refugees. When you look at foreigners, there are many people who have followed a spouse to a new country. Many of these individuals are forbidden to work in the country, don’t have strong English skills, and end up feeling quite isolated. When the problem is compounded by being a refugee, men and women who have been forced to leave their home country in the middle of college or career may or may not have the immediate ability to continue their education or career in the English language. By helping immigrants and refugees to learn English with college level proficiency, it will put them in a better place to be able to continue their life in a manner closer to what they hoped before being leaving their country of birth.

When I help a refugee or foreigner by doing something I love, both of us win. The refugee or foreigner wins by getting one step closer to their goal. I win by having the joy of doing something I love while serving God.