The Bible & Displaced People – Session 1: Introduction

250504 – The Bible & Displaced People – Session 1

My name’s Tim, if I’ve not met you, I’ve been here about six months. I’m originally from Essex on the east coast of England, but moved to Latimer Road about six months ago. Come on, I love that.

So it’s great to have a chance to speak tonight. I’ll say a bit more about what we’re gonna think about in a moment. Oh, well, it’s already on the screen.

But why don’t you turn to the person next to you or someone near you, especially someone you haven’t met before or haven’t seen in a while. And I’d love you to chat about this question. This question, when you hear the words displaced people, what comes to mind? And there are no right answers here, okay? I’m not looking for the politically correct answer or for whatever, what actually comes to mind when you hear these words, displaced people? You’ve got a couple of minutes, then I’ll call you back.

So yeah, have a think about that. Great, I’m gonna call you back. Again, there’s no right answers here.

This is a safe place, so yeah, this is a safe place. So please be honest. What are some of the things that come to mind when you hear those words? Just shout out.

War, conflict. Refugee camps, Richard, thank you. Famine.

Anything else? Yeah, it’s a negative thing, it’s difficult. Forced, yeah. Uncomfortable, thank you, yeah.

Yeah, forced to flee. Great, how does it make you feel when you think about this word? Sad, yeah, heavy. Angry.

Yeah, yeah, me too. Sorry, what’s your name? Gideon, that’s it, Gideon, yeah. I probably feel the same, Gideon, yeah.

I feel just the same, yeah. Okay, I wanna do another thing, and I’d like you to close your eyes if you’re comfortable. If you’re not feeling safe closing your eyes, that’s okay.

But what I’d like to do is for you to think about a time where you were in a strange place, a strange place or a place you didn’t expect to find yourself, maybe a new place. And be safe here, don’t push yourself. If there’s a really scary memory, you don’t need to go there.

It can be something quite small, like you thought you were going to one tube station, you ended up going the wrong way on the tube. It could be that. But yeah, just close your eyes and think about that time.

I’ll give you a moment to think about that, a strange place that you didn’t expect to be in. Just imagine what you can feel around you in that memory, where you were, what you can see, what you can smell or hear. Just gonna ask you a few questions about that space.

Keep your eyes closed. You don’t need to say anything, just think about the questions. How did it feel being in that space? What did you want or need while you were in that space? Was there anything good about being in that space? Was there something positive or good that came from it or that was with you in that space? And what did you learn from being in that space? Great, thanks guys.

You can open your eyes. Now, you may have been thinking about what you’re gonna have for dinner. It’s fine if that’s what you’re thinking about.

But hopefully some of you were just beginning to think about that. Just think about what it’s like to be in a strange and uncomfortable space. Maybe, again, just turn to the person next to you.

If you’re willing to share with them, what was the memory you were thinking of? And just tell them a little bit about it and what it felt like to be in that space. You got one minute. Nice, thanks guys.

Just gonna bring you back together. Sorry to interrupt your conversations. Maybe you can pick them up later on.

So, I hope that wasn’t too uncomfortable. Sorry, if it was. But I just wanted to get us thinking about what it’s like to be in a different and a new space.

Steve has asked me to kick off a new series that we’re doing at Lamb Community Church on displaced people. So, we’re gonna be thinking about that for, is it eight different? About eight different weeks. We’re gonna be looking at different displaced people in the Bible story, okay? I don’t know how much that makes you feel.

Maybe you’re a bit nervous. But I think also it’s a really good thing for us to engage with. Because, as it turns out, this is a really, really important thing in the Bible.

Steve, is there any more you wanna say about where we’re gonna go with that or? Great. Cool, so we’re gonna be looking that over a number of weeks. And tonight, we’re getting set to do that.

And I was thinking about how to do this. And I thought about doing a Bible overview of all the different displaced people who are in the Bible. And then I decided that was a bad idea because we’d be here for about 47 years.

Like, there are just so many people in the Bible. Not just small characters, but big, big main characters who are displaced people or who are refugees. And it’s a really important theme.

So, rather than take you through all of them in some kind of giant list, because that would be quite boring, I’m just gonna, tonight, draw out a few very, very simple key ideas that come up again and again and again in Scripture about displaced people. And they’re not rocket science, okay? By the end of this talk, you probably won’t have, like, learned something particularly new. But hopefully, it will just give us a bit of a sense of the way the Bible thinks about displaced people, okay? And hopefully, by the end of it, we’ll got a bit of framing.

Secondly, hopefully, by the end of it, if we’ve got time, what I’d really love us to do is, like, start activating that knowledge and pray. And I’m gonna invite all of you, as we finish this talk and as Max comes to lead worship again, actually, for us to stand in prayer with displaced people in our community, in our church, and in our world. And that might be something that you’re really used to doing that might be really comfortable for you.

Or it might be something a bit new. But I’m just gonna create the space for us to pray and to really, really push into praying for displaced people. Is that okay? Awesome.

Right, let’s start with Jesus. This isn’t, obviously, about displaced people, this story, but I just wanna dive in, because I really felt like this is the place we need to start. Mark 11, verse 11.

This is at the end of the story, and Jesus has just come through Palm Sunday. They’ve shouted, Hosanna, Hosanna, and they’ve got him into Jerusalem. And here’s what it says.

Jesus entered Jerusalem and went into the temple courts. He looked around at everything, but since it was already late, he went out to Bethany with the 12. Okay, so what we’ve got is we’ve got Jesus.

He comes into Jerusalem. The first thing he does is he goes to the temple. And what does he do? He just looks around.

Has a look. Has a look, takes it all in. Sees what there is to see.

And that’s it. It’s getting late, so Jesus goes out to Bethany, which is a village just outside Jerusalem, and is with his friends. He sleeps, and the next morning, he gets up.

And it turns out that Jesus has been thinking about this stuff that he has seen the previous night. He hasn’t just got up and decided, well, what are we gonna do today? It turns out that this has been on Jesus’ mind, perhaps all through the night. And he gets up, and there’s a whole passage about a fig tree, which we won’t cover.

But it’s clear that Jesus is angry. Something has really stirred Jesus’ anger. You ever been in one of those situations where something happens, and you just sit up all night, and you can’t sleep, because you’re thinking about it, and you’re just fuming? Well, that’s Jesus in this moment.

He’s sitting up all night, and he can’t stop thinking about it. And the next morning, he goes back into Jerusalem. And what does he do? Where do you think he goes? Back to the temple courts.

And you guys will know this story. Here it goes, verse 15. On reaching Jerusalem, Jesus entered the temple courts and began to drive out all those who were buying and selling there.

He overturned the tables of the money changers and the benches of those selling doves, and would not allow anyone to carry merchandise through the temple courts. And as he taught them, it’s an interesting way of teaching. And as he taught them, he said, is it not written, my house will be called a house of prayer for all peoples, but you have made it a den of robbers and thieves? I’ll say that again.

My house, oh, wow, it’s there. My house will be called a house of prayer for all nations, but you have made it a den of robbers. This word here, nations, in the Greek is ethnies, a house of prayer for all ethnies, where we get the word ethnic groups.

A house of prayer for all the peoples of the earth, for you have made it a den of robbers and thieves. What is it that gets Jesus so angry? Well, it’s a couple of things. One of the things that Jesus sits up all night fuming about, and then he goes and acts on it the next day, is that they’re selling in the temple, okay? That’s part of it.

He’s really angry that they’ve turned a place of worship into a marketplace. But the other thing, the other thing is this, that it’s meant to be a house of prayer for all peoples. I.e., this is meant to be a space where all ethnic groups around the world can come and encounter God, but they have turned it into an inward-looking thing that’s only concerned with themselves.

And I wanna be careful here, but sometimes, here in the UK, the church has done the same. And we’re living in a really, really, really dangerous moment right now for the church in the UK, where the tide of racism is rising, the tide of anti-immigrant sentiment is rising, and I’m not gonna get into loads of politics today, but some really, really nasty, negative things are happening in our politics in the UK. And the British church is gonna have to make a decision, okay, we’re gonna have to decide, are we gonna go with the flow of bashing people who are from other places, or are we gonna be like Jesus and make our churches safe, welcoming spaces for all? That’s a really big question for us.

And one of the most pressing questions within that question is about displaced people and refugees. So let’s think about displaced people and refugees. Steve, could you head to the next slide, please? Just wanna, again, ask a question about this word displaced people, about what does it mean, okay? Let’s wait for it.

I want you to turn to the person next to you and come up with a definition of displaced people. What is a displaced person? You have two minutes. Great, and the next question, why might they be displaced? You’ve said some of this already, but just again, think of all the reasons you can think of why they might be displaced.

Great. Steve, let’s go to the next slide. And here is the United Nations definition, okay? This word is not a legal term, and different people have different definitions of it.

But since we’re gonna be thinking about these people for the next eight weeks, I thought probably we’d better get some kind of definition. So let me read this out to you. It might be a bit small for some of you to follow, but I’ll read it out.

So displaced people, according to the United Nations, are people who have been forced to flee or to leave their homes, in particular as a result of armed conflict, situations of violence, violations of human rights, or natural or human-made disasters. This definition covers both internal and cross-border displacement. That means that it could be somebody who’s displaced within their own nation or displaced to another country.

Okay, with that in mind, one more question. And this is, can you think of any… Actually, let’s skip to the… Oh, no, actually, we’ll just run through these. I’m just gonna rattle through them.

Guys, some famous refugees and displaced people. I just think this is really interesting. Oh, Jesus, yeah, we’ve broken the seal, there we go.

Yeah, Mo Farah is the first one. Come on, look at that. Come on.

So here we, Mo Farah, the Olympic runner. Who’s next, Steve? Albert Einstein. Did you know that? I didn’t know that.

That’s amazing, isn’t it? What an amazing guy. Who’s this? Doctor Who, Chuti Gatwa, is a Believer Rwandan refugee. So his family, he was born in Rwanda and they came to Scotland at a very young age.

Who’s this? Yeah, anyone know Malala’s story? Amazing, amazing girl opposing the Taliban was shot in the head. Loads of people were praying. My mom was praying fiercely and she survived.

And now she’s an amazing campaigner. And the next one, on quite a different note, who’s this? Freddie Mercury. I never knew this until I was Googling it this afternoon.

Freddie Mercury fled from Zanzibar in his youth and came to the UK. Isn’t that interesting? There’s some really interesting people who are famous. And what about in the Bible? Well, I’m just gonna run through five really simple points.

And again, this is not rocket science, but I hope you can come with me on this. So number one, displaced people are everywhere in the Bible. They’re just so many.

They’re just so many. Another question for you, how many? This is a percentage question. What percentage of the books in the Bible do you think have at least one main character who is a displaced person? Mary.

So I was thinking about this. And you could say 100% because Jesus is the main character of all books of the Bible. It’s actually not 100% by my reckoning.

So what I mean by this question, okay, Simon’s gone 75. 60, okay. 85.

I’ve actually got it at 70%, okay. So actually a bit lower than you all thought. And by that, what I mean is that really like a big, big hitting character in that book is a displaced person at some point in their life.

Isn’t that really interesting? 70% of the books in the Bible. That was literally my count. It’s not an official statistic.

But there are so many. And they’re in all of the different portions of the Bible. So in the first five books, the kind of law, you’ve got Joseph as one example.

In the history books, you’ve got Ruth, who’s a fantastic example. In the later New Testament, in the prophets, Jeremiah. I think Jeremiah is such an interesting example.

Jeremiah spends his entire life prophesying that his people are gonna be forced into exile. They don’t listen to him. And they get sent into exile.

And what does he do? He says, okay, well, I’ll come with you because I’m part of you. And so he gets dragged off with them. What a profound, profound commitment to his people from Jeremiah.

Priscilla and Aquila in the New Testament, two of the big hitters of the New Testament, they were displaced at least once. Another one for you would be John at the very end of the Bible. John’s living in exile on Patmos.

He’s been displaced when he writes Revelation. And the stories could go on. It’s absolutely everywhere.

Secondly, displaced people are often heroes. Okay? Displaced people in the Bible are often heroes. They’re the people who God uses to do incredible, incredible things.

Just one example out of many. Who do you reckon this is? Yes, Esther. This is an AI-generated image of Esther.

How good is that? I don’t know what to think about that. But that was basically the only not white Esther that the internet would give me. And I was like, great, well, I just have to go for the AI one.

What a bleak, bleak situation anyway. So Esther, what an incredible story. She’s living in displacement in a foreign land.

She’s young. But as God says, or as she reflects, or Mordecai says, you were born for such a time as this. And she becomes one of the most significant people in the Bible story.

And she rescues hundreds of thousands of people’s lives. There are multiple examples of people who rescue thousands of lives. Daniel is another one.

Daniel is a displaced man living in a foreign country, not of his own choosing. He saves thousands of lives. Joseph, I’ve just read the story of Joseph through, and I’m thinking about him a lot.

Amazing, amazing story of a man who is forced into displacement, experiences so much horror. But what happens at the end of the story? He says, well, God’s hand was on this because through this, thousands of lives have been delivered from famine. And so there are incredible stories of heroic, heroic displaced people.

Ruth would be another brilliant example. On the other hand, think three. I think this is really important.

This is really important. On the other hand, in the Bible, displaced people are normal people who struggle, make mistakes, and need support from their friends, okay? And it’s really easy to list off all of these amazing big hits, like Joseph and Ruth, whatever. But they really need help, many of them.

And they often have very, very, very low moments. Here’s Joseph. And I think, actually, this picture is a bit too glamorous.

The way Joseph describes the prison that he’s in, in the original, is actually just the word pit. We translate it prison. It’s pit.

He’s first thrown into a pit by his brothers, and then he ends up in another pit in Egypt. Displaced. And there’s this moment where he says, please, please, when you go back to the Pharaoh, when he interprets the man’s dream, would you just remember me? Because here I am in this pit all alone.

And he’s not the only one. The people of Israel later sing, by the rivers of Babylon we sat and we wept as we remembered our homeland of Zion. Do you know that verse? There are many, many stories in the Bible of displaced people in a foreign land having moments of profound grief and lamentation.

Just one story. I used to live in France, and I lived in a town called Avignon. And I was teaching English.

And on the side, I started doing some very, very limited English classes with some refugees who lived there. And to be perfectly honest, I don’t know how much English they learned. Because mainly what would happen is they would cook a giant pot of stew, and it was absolutely flipping incredible.

And then they would just play me Ed Sheeran videos and be like, translate this for us. And I was trying to translate Ed Sheeran into French. And I was like, I’m not entirely sure anyone’s learning anything here.

But we had a good time. I remember they used to always be playing cricket outside. There were lots and lots of Afghans.

And the Afghans were just always absolutely banging at cricket. But anyway, one of the worst things about this country as well is that we don’t let refugees work. We should really do that.

It’s really important that people can work if they want to. I don’t wanna dwell on that too much anymore, but it’s really, really hard being a displaced person. And that’s why we wanna wrap around them as communities and look after people as best we can.

Speaking of which, thing four. Let’s go. In the Bible, the way we treat displaced people is the way we treat God.

In the Bible, the way we treat displaced people is the way we treat God. I’m just gonna read out three verses. Two of them are just commands, and the third one is really, really quite profound.

So, Exodus 23, nine. This is God speaking to his people. God speaking.

You must not, you must not oppress foreigners. You know what it’s like to be a foreigner. For you yourselves were once foreigners in the land of Egypt.

Secondly, Jeremiah 7, six. If you do not oppress the foreigner, Jeremiah 7, verse six. If you do not oppress the foreigner, the fatherless or the widow, and do not shed innocent blood in this place, if you do not follow other gods to your own harm, then I will bless you.

And there are loads and loads of commandments like that in the Bible. Do not oppress the foreigner. But Proverbs 14, 31 says this.

Whoever oppresses the poor taunts their maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honours him. In this moment, actually, God doesn’t say don’t, he doesn’t say don’t do bad things, but he actually says, if you oppress the poor, you oppress me. If you mistreat those who are in need in your community, it’s me that you’re mistreating.

But if you honour and are kind to the poor, you honour me directly. Isn’t that amazing? It’s not the only place in scripture where God says something like that, but he says it here. And that word, the poor, in the Old Testament often refers to four specific groups of people.

One of them is refugees and migrants living in your land. It’s in the top four. And that’s in mind when this verse is said.

So that’s really important for us to dwell on. And then finally, thing five, and then let’s pray together. In the Bible, displaced people are invited to rebuild the ruins, and there will be a home for everyone.

Okay, in the Bible, displaced people are invited to rebuild the ruins, and there will be a home for everybody. Isaiah 61, verse four. This is God speaking about a group of displaced people going back to their homeland.

And it’s really about Israel, but I think for us, it applies to all peoples through Jesus Christ. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated. They will renew the ruined cities that have been devastated for generations.

Or 58, your people will rebuild the ancient ruins. They will raise up the age-old foundations. You will be called repairer of broken walls, restorer of streets with dwellings.

We could just go to the next slide. This is a picture of a woman in Homs in Syria. A place that has been absolutely devastated by appalling warfare.

And she’s kind of just standing there in the rubble that’s been created by missiles. Obviously, this is just one of the many places that we could be thinking about in the world. I really believe that God says to people like her, if you could go back to it, to the last slide, to people like this woman, your people will rebuild the ancient ruins and raise up the age-old foundations.

You will be called repairer of broken walls, restorer of streets with dwellings. And that’s how the Bible concludes, right? With God rebuilding the world. But he invites all people, including displaced people, to be part of that.

I hope that was helpful to you. That’s like a whistle-stop tour of scripture. And five points.

We could have made many more, but I hope that some of those are helpful. What I’d love us to do now is actually to just reflect on that for ourselves, and if it’s okay, to pray for others. So if it’s okay, can I invite you to stand? If you’re able.

Don’t worry if you’re not able to stand, that’s fine. And we’re gonna sing, I think, Living Hope. Is that right? Yeah.

And I wanna invite you quite directly to do something that might be very normal to you, or might be the first time you’ve ever done this. But I’d like to invite us to sing this entire song about other people. Often we sing worship songs, and it’s about me and God, and that’s great, I love that.

He is my living hope, he is your living hope. But I wanna invite us, as Latinx church tonight, to sing this song prophetically over refugees. And it might be somebody you know, and actually many of us will know one person in particular in this community who really, really, really needs breakthrough in his life, inside and out.

And if you wanna spend this whole song singing over that man, some of you will know who I mean, then do. Others of you will know other refugees and displaced people. Others of you will maybe not know someone in particular, but you might think of a country in the world where there has been war, like Afghanistan or Ukraine.

And maybe you wanna just sing this song as best you can.