“Finding a Home” - July 31, 2016

Psalm 107

            The Bible is full of refugee stories. 

Abraham was a nomad.  Isaac and Jacob and their families were nomads.  At one point, there was a drought that left Jacob’s flocks starving and he had to send his sons to Egypt to try to buy grain to sustain his family.  That was how the Israelites made their way to Egypt, where they were at first welcomed but later enslaved.  Centuries later, their descendants escaped slavery and for a generation they wandered in the desert before entering the Promised Land, where the people living in the cities and the farmlands did not want them.  The result was war.

The book of Ruth takes place long after that, but it is about a woman who fled hunger in the land of Moab with her mother-in-law, who came from Bethlehem.  Her grandson, David, would become a political refugee when King Saul drove him out of his territory.  David’s descendants would become kings but then would also be exiled and live in captivity in Babylon and Nineveh.  Another descendant would, as a little baby, be considered a threat by King Herod and be taken far away, back to Egypt, to escape an attempt to kill him.

The Bible’s commentary and record about the refugee experience is that of the people who were homeless wanderers at some point, not the governments whose policies kept them moving, and the expression of relief and thanksgiving that God was watching over them in their troubles and worked to bring them to a place that they could call “home”.

“Some wandered in the desert wastes,

            finding no way to a city in which to dwell;

hungry and thirsty,

their soul fainted within them.

Then in their trouble, they cried to the Lord,

            who delivered them from their distress,

and led them by a straight way,

            till they reached a city in which to dwell.” [Psalm 107:33-38]

            If homeless people were never guided to a place of safety and refuge, very few of us would be here today.

The winter of 1710 was a rough one in Germany and Holland.  It was so cold that the ocean itself turned to ice in the port of Rotterdam.  It was made worse by a French invasion the previous year, which had destroyed a good part of the harvest and left people to starve.  So when the Rhine River froze solid, it provided a highway for a steady stream of hungry peasants who overran the Dutch ports, trying to get to England, away from the warfare.  The English took in a few boatloads, not knowing how many people were on the way, and established a refugee camp in Greenwich, near London, that soon became dangerously overpopulated.  The English government tried unsuccessfully to return them to Germany and then, as a fallback plan, loaded them onto ships and sent them to New York and New Jersey.  They were basically dumped off with the agreement that if they cut down enough trees for the Royal Navy’s needs, nobody would bother them for back charges on food and transport.  That’s how one branch of my own family got here.

            Resistance to newcomers is nothing new either.  Just like the governments in Rotterdam and London and New York kept people moving along, the people of the Bible were often made unwelcome.  However the Bible’s witness is that the Lord frowns on those who increase their suffering.

“When they are diminished and brought low

through oppression, trouble, and sorrow,

the Lord pours contempt upon princes

and makes them wander in trackless wastes;

but the Lord raises up the needy out of affliction,

and makes their families like flocks.” [Psalm 107:39-41]

I don’t want to dwell on that part.  That’s a sermon for people in Washington more than Phoenixville.  I want to concentrate on the work of the Lord on behalf of those who are trying to find a home and thanksgiving that they do eventually settle, because that is a process that we are actively involved in, and one that is cause for celebration in the midst of concern. 

I hope we continue to remember that children are often on the run from drug cartels in Central America and that we do not forget people crossing the Sahara or the Mediterranean because their towns have come under attack, often because they are Christian.  If we don’t keep such people in our prayers, they will be forgotten not only by us but also by others.

Then, too, there are situations closer to hand where we can and do respond directly, not out of political expedience but because it is what our faith directs us to do. 

There are natural disasters that leave people homeless, and when we give to UMCOR, the United Methodist Committee on Relief, they are helped not only with immediate disaster response but also with help for the long work of rebuilding.  When there were floods in West Virginia this year, UMVIM, United Methodist Volunteers in Mission, were among those who helped restore people’s homes to livable condition. 

Locally, there are women who lose their homes when they flee abuse or other untenable situations.  The House, right here in town, gives them a place to stay until they can get back on their feet.  There are times when men need a place to go when they are discharged from rehab or when unemployment benefits have run out or medical problems have pushed them over the edge, and Good Samaritan Shelter helps them through it.  We assist both of those groups in our way.  When there are children involved, St. Mary’s Franciscan Shelter steps in, and there are weeks when it is our turn to provide dinners:

“…hungry and thirsty,

their soul fainted within them.

Then in their trouble, they cried to the Lord,

                        who delivered them from their distress…”

The casseroles we cook may not be the cure to everything, but without that kind of help from us and many others, the bigger problems could never be addressed.  PACS and Orion can and do help people who need assistance to stay in their housing when they get behind and could become homeless, and Good Works helps when houses need repairs that the owners cannot handle on their own.

            These responses do not come about automatically.  It is churches like ours and St. John’s and St. Ann’s and St. Peter’s and Grimes and Otterbein and Bethel and First Presbyterian and on and on and on and Synagogue Beth Jacob who get these projects going and keep things running.  It is easy enough to say that the problems of the world are just too great and the problems of individuals are just too messy and, honestly many of them arise from bad choices.  Psalm 107 includes verses that we didn’t read this morning that recognize that. 

“Some sat in darkness and in gloom,
   prisoners in misery and in irons, 
for they had rebelled against the words of God,
   and spurned the counsel of the Most High. 
Their hearts were bowed down with hard labor;
   they fell down, with no one to help. 
Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
   and he saved them from their distress; 
he brought them out of darkness and gloom,
   and broke their bonds asunder.” [Psalm 107:10-14]

And

“Some were sick through their sinful ways,
   and because of their iniquities endured affliction; 
they loathed any kind of food,
   and they drew near to the gates of death. 
Then they cried to the Lord in their trouble,
   and he saved them from their distress; 
he sent out his word and healed them,
   and delivered them from destruction.” [Psalm 107:17-20]

The most human response is to say, “You got yourself into it; you get yourself out of it.”  It is to divide people into the “deserving poor” and the rest of them.  Psalm 107 says that God doesn’t do that.  It takes people of faith who remember, thanks to the way the scriptures remind us, that we’ve all been there.  We’ve been there as families and tribes and nations, and we’ve been there as individuals.  We’ve been strangers and we’ve been outsiders and we’ve been without a real place in the world, but the Lord provides. 

Even more than that, we have the words of Jesus, who knew what it was to be without a place to settle, but who promises a home one day that is better than anything we could look for here.  He said,

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house there are many dwelling-places. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, so that where I am, there you may be also.”  [John 14:1-3]

That’s the place to which all others point, where we can finally all settle down in peace and unity and as one great family simply be together where we all belong.