EMMAUS: Welcoming the Stranger, Walking in the New World

 We live in a world where we are taught to fear the strangers. We tell our children not to talk to strangers. We are wary of strangers. They may bring us harm. They may bring us disease. They may bring us burdens. They may disturb our peace. They may be a threat to our security.

 

The history of immigration in this country was in some way tainted by this fear of the stranger. “These new immigrants will take away our jobs and will become a burden to our economy.” So we build walls, we barb wire  our fences,  we strengthen our borders. We tighten our immigration policies.

 

Some of our fears of the stranger issued itself in the form of racist laws and discriminatory policies. On May 6, 1882, the U.S. government issued the Chinese Exclusion Act. Signed by then President Chester Arthur, it was one of the most notorious restrictions in United States immigration history. The Act not only prohibited immigration of Chinese laborers but also deported many who were already here. After they helped America to develop their mining industry and built its transcontinental railroads, the Chinese immigrants were branded as “yellow peril” and sent back to China.  The Act was initially intended to last for ten years but continued for many years until repealed in 1943.

 

On February 19, 1942 following the bombing of Pearl Harbor and the outbreak of the War in the Pacific, U.S. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt issued Executive Order 9066. It was known as the “the Japanese Internment Act.”  On May 3, 1942, General DeWitt ordered all people of Japanese ancestry to be incarcerated in various Internment Camps in remote areas in the country. Overnight, 110,000 Japanese immigrants— 62% of them American citizens— were removed from their homes and herded into concentration camps.

 

America used to be known as a “Christian country” but because of fear, we forget what the Bible says in Exodus 22:21:"Do not oppress a foreigner; you yourselves know how it feels to be foreigners, because you were also foreigners.” Because of fear, we forget the inscription written on the Statue of Liberty, a poem from Emma Lazarus:

 

 

So it is a credit to the disciples of Jesus that they welcomed the stranger to walk with them. At this point of their lives, they felt they had nothing to lose. Their leader Jesus had died and they were lonely. This man whom they looked as the deliverer was rejected, arrested, crucified, died and was buried. They felt empty, their hearts forlorn and their hopes droop. What they needed most was a companion on the journey. They forgot their fears; they become vulnerable and they opened their lives to the stranger. Not only that they allowed the stranger to walk with them; they sat down at table and shared their food.

 

Asian theologian D. T. Niles wrote, “Evangelism is a beggar telling another beggar where to find bread.” When Jesus saw the crowd, he had compassion for they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd (Matthew 9:36). When Christianity was introduced to India, the first ones who responded were the Dalits or the “untouchables.” They were the oppressed, the massa perditionis, the marginalized, the outcast of society.  It is when you feel vulnerable that you are open to the move of the Spirit. It is when you feel you are a stranger that you are kind to strangers; it is when you are wounded that you care for the wounded. Because you remember that you were a foreigner once, that you are also kind and welcoming to the foreigner.

 

Not only that the disciples listened to his story; they also invited the stranger to dinner.  And the miracle happened! As this stranger broke bread, their eyes were opened and they recognized him as the risen Christ! In the past, their ancestors had welcomed the strangers who turned out to be angels; now, they had welcomed a stranger who turned out to be the Christ!  

 

As the risen Jesus vanished from their sight, they said to themselves, “Did not our hearts burned within us as while he talked with us on the road and opened the scriptures to us?” Unable to contain this joy, they hurried back to Jerusalem and told the other disciples that Jesus had risen from the dead.

 

The experience of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus, the lessons they learned from the stranger and the Holy Communion they partook from the risen Christ, were the rewards they received for being open and welcoming to the stranger. Their ears heard the Good News because they were open; their hearts were warmed because they were not hardened; their eyes recognized Jesus because they were ready to see the miracle.

 

As they shared the Good News, they were willing to enter a new world, a world they have not known before. The Bible would later say that the risen Christ took them as far as Bethany to be a witness to his ascension into heaven. Jesus commissioned them to go and make disciples of all nations and to believe that He will be with them to the ends of the world (Matthew 28:19). Jesus summoned them to live a life without fear, to enter a world where death has no more dominion, a world where all things are possible —-and to a new life can be lived in all its fullness.

 

Let me now stretch your imagination and ask: What is this new world in our context? What is our road to Emmaus? For me it is the world of the internet. It is a world that for a long time, I had ignored. I grew up in the world of manual typewriters and rotary phones; of transistor radios, sewing machines and black and white TV’s.  In my over sixty years of life, I have experienced that has evolved: from an agricultural era, to industrial era and now the computer-internet era.

 

The Emmaus that we are in is changing very rapidly. When I came to New York in 2004, I rode in the subway train and there were still people still looking at me. But now, nobody is looking at each other—because everyone is busy with their iphones or smart phones: talking, texting, twitting or checking their Facebook and other social networking.