Let’s say you’ve been visiting Europe and now it’s time to return to the good ’ole U.S.A. You arrive at the airport with your plane ticket, your maxed-out credit cards, and five pounds of new body fat, but you’ve lost your passport. Uh, oh. What would happen?
At the very least, you’d be looking at some major administrative headaches and travel delays. You can get by without a lot of things when you’re travelling to and from a foreign country, but a passport isn’t one of them.
I went with a group to England several years ago and our trip leader reminded us emphatically and frequently: “Do not, do not, DO NOT lose your passport.” I kept up with that little blue booklet like it was a winning lottery ticket.
That’s one reason I’m perplexed about the immigrant caravans currently heading to our border from Central America. These folks have no passports and no reason to expect they’ll be allowed into the U.S., but they’re coming anyway.
I’m not sure why they believe they don’t have to follow the same rules the rest of us must obey, or why our government officials are being portrayed as barbaric and heartless for enforcing immigration laws every other country in the world enforces.
God most assuredly loves every one of those people in the caravans and we’re certainly called to love them, too. But while the Apostle Paul sets the love bar high in his letter to the church in Corinth (see 1 Corinthians 13), loving people doesn’t necessarily mean yielding to their unlawful wishes or demands.
In a perfect world, maybe there wouldn’t be any borders, but this world is far from perfect and Acts 17:26 says God ordains national boundaries in accordance with His sovereign plans. Daniel 2:21 affirms that same truth regarding the rulers of nations, as hard as that may be to swallow when we consider some who’ve risen to power throughout history.
If we were perfect people with sinless hearts, we wouldn’t need laws, but we’re not, so we do. Laws may not be convenient, but they’re also not optional, and the same Paul who penned 1 Corinthians 13 also commanded us to be “subject to the governing authorities” (see Romans 13).
I don’t know exactly what’s going to happen when all those Central Americans arrive at our border, but I’m pretty sure most will end up disappointed, angry and disillusioned. Perhaps many were told lies about what it takes to get into our country or led to believe our laws would be waived for them, and that’s sad, indeed. But that doesn’t mean the laws, or those enforcing them, are wrong.
As tragic as this situation is, it’s not nearly as tragic as the lies people believe about what’s required to get across another infinitely more important border we’ll all arrive at one day—the boundary between this life and the next.
So many seem to believe God will contradict His word and ultimately let everyone into heaven. Or they hope their good deeds will get them in. But no amount of hoping will make that so.
God is love, but He’s also truth and justice, and all those attributes merge in His one and only plan for our redemption: “… He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but inherit eternal life … (John 3:16).”
Jesus is our passport and our only way into God’s heaven. As the Apostle Peter said of Christ, “… there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved (Acts 4:12).”
You can get by without a lot of things when you die, but faith in Christ isn’t one of them.