Customer Reviews

Welcoming the Stranger: Justice, Compassion & Truth in the Immigration Debate

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Friendship is the face that Welcoming the Stranger gives to the situation of both legal and illegal immigrants. The book looks at immigration and offers constructive suggestions for response by the Christian faith community. Matthew Soerens and Jenny Hwang craft a viewpoint based on rational consideration of immigration and a biblically informed direction for the church and Christ followers.

The authors review the history of immigration and the current situation of the legal system that that should be governing the immigration process. They survey key biblical texts related to people who migrate, review concerns by some about immigration, the economic value of immigrants, and propose some concrete responses.

The writers draw from their extensive personal and professional experiences working with immigrants and refugees. Soerens is an immigration attorney. Hwang is an advocacy worker in Washington, DC. Both work on staff for World Relief.

Soerens and Hwang assert that the only way to resolve the situation of many individual migrants will be to change the law. Because we live in a democracy ". . . the dilemma of wanting to welcome immigrants while also expecting people to follow the law is not insurmountable: we can overcome this dilemma by changing the law so that many of those who today come illegally would be able to enter legally." (P. 111) This will be the path to showing compassion for immigrants and not encouraging them to break any laws. For the last 10-years the economy has absorbed immigrant workers at a higher rate than the legal system is designed to process.

Calling on the church to live up to her commitment to justice, compassion and truth, this book provides practical, positive steps to disciple the church as she responds to immigration and immigrants: prayer, knowing, learning from our immigrant neighbors, giving, educating our churches and communities, and advocacy for better laws.

Discussion questions in the appendix provide the opportunity for groups to reflect on and respond to the ideas in the book. Other helpful resources include a list of books, websites, organizations and ministries that work with immigrants, justice and root causes of immigration.

As a result of reading the book we can be ready to welcome the opportunities brought by immigrants and immigration. Many immigrants and their families would welcome friendships from majority culture Christians. Out of these relationships, a better more Christian community can emerge.

I highly recommend this book. A book like this has been needed for a long time. Immigration issues are affecting USA as well as many other countries around the world. Rather than simply recite the familiar arguments that one reads in the newspaper, this book is written to address the issues from a Christian perspective. No one who takes seriously the commands to love your neighbor and to care for the alien can ignore this issue. The book is very readable, especially because of how the authors give examples from their personal experiences. There is a chapter that gives a brief history on immigration in the USA which is very interesting.

I just finished, "Welcoming the Stranger". This book takes today's current immigration reality in the U.S. and examines it from several relevant angles. First it describes very accurately and puts a human face on the current mess that we find ourselves in today. Next, it places the current immigration situation in the U.S. into it's historical context. This is very helpful and reminds one that "there is nothing new under the sun". Finally the book takes a very balanced and comprehensive look at how the Bible speaks to the issue. It then ends with some very practical chapters on what we as followers of Christ can do to make a difference through our lives and in our political advocacy. My eyes were opened through reading this book. I highly recommend it.

Finally we have a solid and personal look at immigration from a faithful Christian perspective!

Soerens and Hwang do an impressive job making a complex and charged issue accessible for the average reader. An especially helpful trait of the book is that they couch current immigration questions and debates within a well-researched biblical and historical context, and keep it personal by sharing real life stories from their work and ministries. What an important reminder that, while immigration reform is often seen as a theoretical debate, its primarily about real people with real stories, real needs, and real hopes, not very different from ourselves.

This book is well worth reading and passing along!

Soerens and Hwang present a long-awaited, personal, and comprehensive approach to understanding immigration reform. From the beginning of the book, they do not make this a political battlefield, but the set about making this issue about real human beings and the importance of keeping families together.

Both authors' personal stories from living abroad and from their own neighborhoods, allow them to write with confidence about the need for amelioration in our immigration system. The authors urge the Church to grow in advocacy for this issue through the motivation of personal connection, and thus growing in the Christ-taught virtues of hospitality and service.

By getting to know, investing in, serving, and loving the strangers in the church's immediate community, may the church then seek justice at a larger scale for those who are closest to them. May the stirring stories told by Soerens and Hwang inspire you to incline your ear, open your heart and welcome the stranger in your own community.

The book is practical in it's informative nature while intricately weaving real stories of immigrants between the facts. Which allows the reader an opportunity to identify with those whom our society ostracise's due to their ignorance and mis-informed facts. Great read!

The short story:

1. This is the clearest, most concise, and irenic book on a political issue that I have ever read. (And I don't say that about many books, feel free to peruse my other reviews).

2. All Christians should read this book. This is an issue about which we cannot remain ignorant and silent. In fact, read it and buy an extra copy for your pastor.

The long(er) story:

I still can't quite grasp what made a book about immigration so riveting and spiritual, and yet those are the two words I feel most accurately describe this book. While it's not a page turner a-la-John-Grisham, I found myself chewing on ideas the authors had expressed and longing to know more. Combining the basic Biblical value of care for one another with the need for Christian involvement in immigration support and reform, Matt Soerens and Jenny Hwang lay out a clear, well-documented, and compelling examination of the state of immigration in America.

While keeping the value of the individual at the forefront, they examine the complex dynamics of undocumented workers, the history of immigration in the US, and legal components of our modern day immigration policy. While addressing concerns regarding immigration, they also present the positive effects that immigration has on a society. Finally, they close the book with a call to the church to embrace the `stranger among us'. Spiritually, I appreciated most their commitment to integrate justice, compassion, and truth by presenting both individual stories and national responsibilities. Their ultimate perspective seems well summarized through what Intervarsity pastor Bill Nelson says, "Whenever there is opportunity for the church to reach out to people in our communities, we must consider what it will take to further the kingdom. If it means putting down the American flag and raising the kingdom flag, that is what we should do."

I've tried reading other books on immigration, but none of them have been so clear in connecting all the dots between history, policy, and Biblical mandates. Thank you, Matthew & Jenny. You've given us all a great gift. I'll be passing my copy along to as many people as possible!

Matthew Soerens and Jenny Hwang write a compelling analysis of our immigration dilemma. Not only do they address the history of immigration and current proposed solutions to the debate, but they provide the very heart of the issue through personal stories, and a well-presented review of Scripture. I have the privilege of working with many immigrants and appreciate Matthew and Jenny's dispelling common immigrant myths. I strongly recommend their book and hope it sheds light for many on this complex and important issue.

Bruce Strom
Administer Justice

The current public hot button seems to be legal (i.e., documented) immigration versus illegal (i.e., undocumented) migration across the U.S.-Mexican border. It is an issue that is also dividing segments the American church and sincere Christians fall on every side of the question. Some, see their primary allegiance to God's kingdom, a "kingdom-without-borders", and are pulled between compassion for undocumented migrants and adherence to civil law, feeling tugged in both directions and seeking an informed response. Others feel that the law must be obeyed and enforced. In their just-released book "Welcoming the Stranger", World Relief staff members, Matthew Sorens and Jenny Hwang, have stepped up to offer an assessment of this divisive matter from a Christian/biblical point of view.

We often hear proponents on all sides of this issue say that the solution to the undocumented migrant problem is simple: just follow the law. But as the authors point out, "It is these `easy' issues that often prove the most complex and hardest to resolve." Why? Because, "our presumptions keep us from hearing the other side." If we seek an answer from scripture, we understand soon enough that God, centuries ago, made provision for the "alien among you." To the generation of Moses (and as most Christians believe, all subsequent generations) God said, "Do not oppress an alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be aliens, because you were aliens in Egypt" (Exodus 23:9). Interestingly, the authors offer a parallel between the situation that existed in biblical Egypt and the one now facing us. Ancient Egyptian immigration policy toward Israelites changed remarkably from the time of Joseph, when Israel was given the choicest parts of Egypt to settle, and that of Moses, four centuries later, when Israel became oppressed by their Egyptian hosts. What caused the change in Egyptian attitude? According to the authors, the change in Egyptian policy was fear that Israelites would soon outnumber Egyptians and pose a political and economic threat. That is precisely the fear that drives the immigration debate today. Except for Native Americans, most of us, on some remote branch of our family tree, have ancestors who were aliens in America and targets of discrimination. We all own an immigrant heritage.

For believers who consider themselves "citizens of another world," a world that owns their primary allegiance, the dilemma remains: illegal migration across U.S borders, and, for the believer, what the appropriate Christian response should be. On the one hand the Bible says, in several places, that we are to welcome and care for the foreigner among us treating them humanely, but on the other we are instructed to submit to civil law, which establishes how undocumented migrants are to become documented immigrants. For the authors it is a matter of "acting justly" (doing what is just and right); not simply "doing justice" (blindly obeying the law). The former--doing justly--demands good judgment; the latter, simple compliance. While Sorens and Hwang may not answer all your questions about the correct response to current immigration policies and, indeed, may even raise more complex questions, they do show us that, if we are to act justly, we will have to consider all its complexities. (reviewed by Jim Miler)

The authors do a very good job of presenting a Christian perspective on the need for true immigration policy reform. At the same time, they put human faces on people who are so often dehumanized, if not downright demonized, in the modern debate on immigration policy. No matter what your position is on the subject, this book will help you to understand the human side of the equation. The book is well written and easy to read. The authors are unabashedly trying to promote an agenda, but they do so clearly, without guile or pretension, and fully explain their reasons for doing so.