Why welcome the stranger?
Are you afraid you don’t have enough
Resources for yourself?
Your family?
Your nation?
Not enough jobs?
Did you forget the story?
How did two fish and five loaves
Become enough to feed thousands?
They would have stayed 2 + 5
If they were not given up and over
To the One
Who holds it all together
Who taught us the new math
Of sowing and reaping
Of trusting and love.
We need reminding
In these times of distress
Times of anxiety:
When we hold our fists
Closed tightly around our resources,
Our love, our humanity
It all turns to dust.
When we open our hands:
The Holy Wind blows
The seeds to good soil
Landing, planting, producing.
Holding fists tightly
Stops the river of blessing
Coming our way.
The stranger show us
The face of God
In a way we do not know.
Our dimensions become wider
New concepts expand our minds
Love expands our hearts.
We become more fully human
More like the One who formed us
And gave us all that we are
All that we have.
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