Dumb Okies Like Me: A New Relfection on America's Greatest Migration

Image Credit: USDA

Today, a historical reflection followed by three principles and three prayers.

The "Dust Bowl" environmental conditions of the 1930s -- a period of extreme and prolonged drought and dust storms affecting especially Great Plains states like Oklahoma -- resulted in the displacement of 3.5 million Americans.  This represented the largest internal migration event in the history of the United States.  

As Oklahoma families struggled to survive in the "dirty thirties", word gradually began to spread about a better land far away.  Consider:

California! California! California! To the Okies the word "California" was magical, describing a place where they could go to better their lives. It was said that thousands of workers were needed to harvest a hundred different crops -- peaches, pears, tomatoes, potatoes, beans, apples, oranges -- the list seemed endless. It was said that no one ever went hungry in California because lush orchards were everywhere and people just helped themselves to whatever fruits or vegetables they wanted. It was said that no one ever got sick out there, ever, and it was big news if anyone died in California before their 200th birthday!  -- Jerry Stanley, Children of the Dust Bowl

Of course, the dark reality was that these promises of paradise were empty and migrant families reached California only to find exploitation, hostility, violence, and hatred towards "dumb Okies".  

As I consider again this part of my home state's history -- I don't think I've given it much thought since high school -- I do so with a mind towards modern displacement stories:

1. Displacement happens for all kinds of reasons and there is really no people group or part of the world that is immune. The number of Syrians that have fled their homeland now far exceeds the total number displaced by the Dust Bowl.  As of writing this, the UNHCR has the total at above 4.3 million.  When in the West we hear of displacement events we tend to think of it as a developing world issue.  But, the Dust Bowl was only a few generations ago and included people that were a lot like me -- maybe even some relatives.  Smaller displacements happen all the time.  It is very foolish to think of displacement as something that could never happen to me.  There is an old Dust Bowl tale of a California child who observed some migrants picking cotton in a field and commented to his father, the owner of the field, "Daddy, those Okies almost look like real people when they stand up on two legs."  Dear God, help me to see myself in the face of every refugee I meet -- we really are the same, whether I see it or not.

2. The promise of a better life somewhere else is still proclaimed wherever people are vulnerable.  I have seen so many examples of this.  I knew of Rohingyas that were migrating en masse to a certain Midwestern city because of the promise of jobs only to find the celebrated factory closed upon their arrival.  I've heard Bhutanese friends tell of the great opportunities in Buffalo and then Oakland and then Pittsburg and now Columbus.  I've heard women tell heartbreaking stories of moving from the village to Kampala because of the promise of a job or a place to stay with relatives only to be exploited and forced into sex work.  I have Nepali friends in Dubai who moved there because of the grand promises of job recruiters only to find themselves in oppressive debt to those same recruiters upon arrival.  Sometimes these promises of greener pastures are told by well-meaning relatives who simply long to reunite the family and will bend the truth in order to accomplish that.  Other times there is intentional and malicious deception spread by oppressors who want to exploit and enslave the vulnerable.  The mission of managing expectations and protecting migrants from exploitation is holy, thankless and difficult.  I have not sorted out how to do it well, but I pray that while mine is just one of many voices my migrant friends will hear, let it at least be truthful.

3.  Too often the world's pilgrims find no welcome.  I can begin to imagine now the feelings of my Okie ancestors who encountered "Okies Keep Out" signs posted seemingly everywhere upon completion of the arduous weeks or months-long journey across Route 66.  Now every, single day my newsfeed has several stories of similar unwelcome.  It may be a presidential candidate in the USA pandering to some rather racist group by spouting anti-immigrant rhetoric or any number of horrific stories of hostility towards refugees in Europe.  It seems like every day I see a new image of refugees crowded at some fence line in Europe.  Meanwhile, I celebrate the nation of Uganda which is currently hosting greater than half a million refugees!  On a recent trip I found myself waiting for my flight at the gate in Dubai.  Glancing around the seating area I noticed that many people where holding the distinctive white and blue plastic bags emblazoned with the letters "IOM".  These were refugees!  I decided to make my way around the room to greet them.  I sat down with one husband and wife from Afghanistan who were on their way to Texas.  We talked for a while and before departing I felt the need to tell them the truth.  "Not everyone will be happy for you to come to America," I said.  "But I am happy.  I welcome you.  I am very glad you are coming to live in my country."  Feeling a heart of welcome to refugees and immigrants is grace.  It must be grace because I have some really awful sin in other parts of my life.  So, since it is grace, I give thanks for it and ask God to increase my welcome and my hospitality.  How can I go to greater lengths to welcome the sojourner?  Lord show me. 

Oy Vey: Remember When it wasn't Cool to be an Anti-Semite

Photo Credit: Unknown (Contact me)

I seriously like Jews.

I mean, I'll pass on the Manishewitz, but in general, wow, I love those people.  Yeshua, of course, is my favorite.  He did die for me after all and indwells me by his Spirit. But, he is in good company.

As a goy-boy growing up in rural Oklahoma I was not afforded many opportunities for, well, schmoozing with the Chosen People, but as my world gloriously expands God is giving me more and more encounters with Jews of many backgrounds.  I'm getting opportunities for cultural learning, friendship and partnership.  Yiddish words and phrases in sitcoms are starting to make sense and I'm secretly (not so secret now, I guess) hoping for an invite to a pakka Purim celebration (okay, "pakka" is Hindi lingo rather than Yiddish, but old habits die hard. Would the Yiddish be echt?)

But what is going on today? Is it just me or is the mood changing?  Though I grew up with very little global exposure, I somehow imbibed a rather undiluted message about the Jews -- i.e. antisemitism is evil.

So why does it suddenly seem more okay to be antisemitic?  Consider the following short video taken of a man simply walking the streets of Paris as a Jew:



Are you kidding me?

Of course this is just the tip of the iceberg with a seemingly growing number of terrorist threats and attacks directed towards Jews, consider:

The recent desecration of Jewish graves in France
The shooting at a synagogue in Denmark
The conspiracy and cover up regarding the massacre of Jews in Argentina

To mention just a few high-profile incidents.

It's enough to prompt Israel's PM, Benjamin Netanyahu to call for Jews to come "home" en masse to the Promised Land.  A fact that's sure to tempt a few of you to dust off some of your old Jenkins-Lahaye novels (you know exactly where they are, don't you?).

Of course, it get's even more meshuggah.  On the one hand, you have Hollywood legend Shirley MacLaine writing some really stupid stuff about karma and the holocaust.  Her speculation that the millions of Jews slaughtered by the Nazis may have had it coming to them due to bad deeds committed in a previous life was newsworthy for about five minutes.  But, hey, Vanilla Ice is trending on Twitter so ... at least our priorities are in order.

Swing the pendulum from the famous to the obscure and you find this bizarre story of a Iowa woman who  was apparently trying to convert a Jewish neighbor to Christianity through the old beat-them-till-they-convert method.

Oy gevalt!

And then there are my own evangelical tribesmen (and tribeswomen) who in their zeal to always be attacking everything that U.S. President Barak Obama says, rushed to defend the Crusades in response to the President's suggestion that they might have been kind of a bad thing.  The standard defense posted and re-posted especially in the Facebook-sphere went something like this:

"Silly Obama, don't you know that the Crusades were essentially defensive struggles against extremist Islamic powers bent on the conquest of Europe?  Gosh, you really are a Muslim aren't you?"

And before you go about comfortably dismissing me to some ideological camp that you've taught yourself to ignore, let me say that I begrudgingly voted for McCain and No One in the past two presidential elections, respectively.  Not that it's any of your business.

But look here.  Putting aside whatever defensive motives may or may not have been at play in the various Crusades (and to what extent those motives were shared by the actual Crusaders) for a moment, I must ask.  Have we really forgotten how many Jews were killed by Christians during the Crusades? I blogged a bit about this recently (Here is the link in case you missed it).  I don't understand how this isn't a no-brainer for my fellow Jesus-followers.  The Crusades resulted in the massacre of thousands of Jews.  They don't get to be defended.  Why isn't that the end of the story?

So, here I am, scratching my head. Praying. And wondering what good a little voice like mine can do in this context.  Should I start a #Jewishlivesmatter or #JesuisHebreu? But leveraging trendiness doesn't go very far.

Pondering.

For now, I feel that I want to say without qualification that I genuinely love and admire the Jews.  As a follower of Jesus, I know that they are a people greatly honored by the God I worship.  I owe my spiritual heritage to their stewardship of faith and the Scriptures.  As a student of people and culture, I am intrigued by the festivals, the language, the religion, the history, the music and pretty much all things Jewish.  As a human, I rejoice in our shared humanity and know that I'm richer in relationship to Jews and poorer when separated.

Those who know me well, will know how sincere I am when I say that I would love for more Jews to move into my neighborhood.  If the man in the video above came walking by my house -- or up to my door -- he would find a warm welcome.

Join me in praying for peace for the Jewish diaspora wherever they live in the world.

Defending the Crusades (Not really, they sucked)

I am grateful to a friend who pointed out this piece. I've held my tongue while the heat was high following the National Pontificating Breakfast. I have no interest in either defending or critiquing President Obama's comments - it never occurs to me to look to sanded down, poll-tested speeches for profound insight anyway. 

However, the subsequent rush to defend the Crusades by many of my fellow Christ-followers was downright embarrassing. At first, I thought it was a joke - something like the Onion. Surely no one would actually try to defend the Crusades.  But, the more I read and saw posted, the more I blushed.  It was true. Which meant that the hatred towards President Obama was felt so hotly by some that they would seek to actually defend one of the darkest moments in Church history. 

Now, I know that some have taken pains to point out the larger context surrounding Crusade history and the various pressures that gave rise to a war between European and Islamic powers. This is well and good. A passing reference to the Crusades as "bad" is certainly abbreviating matters. However, it isn't abbreviating matters incorrectly. Yes, there were genuine acts of piety and golden feats of heroism along with understandable and necessary military campaigns designed for legitimate defensive aims.  But, the Crusades featured so much evil and of such a wretched sort and so blatantly "in the name of Christ" that the only reasonable response of the modern day disciple of Jesus is to lament.  

I would respectfully urge those who have tried to defend the Crusades to read this very solid NYTimes article on the first victims of the First Crusade. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/15/opinion/sunday/the-first-victims-of-the-first-crusade.html

If the massacre of Jews that started off the Crusades had been the only atrocity committed, it would be enough for me to condemn the whole affair. But, so much more would follow. 

Our history is what it is. And there is a lot of garbage there. And none of it makes any of the horrors being carried out by ISIS, Boko Haram, etc. even the least bit more acceptable or understandable. Indeed, it seems to me that the Church today would find its prophetic word all the more powerful in the face of such evils if we could soundly and unanimously condemn the sin we ourselves have been guilty of in the past.

Happy 206th, President Lincoln: Slavery Abolition Facts

In honor of Abraham Lincoln's 206th birthday, here are some abolition facts for you:

Iceland abolished slavery in A.D. 1117.

Pope Paul III forbid the enslavement of indigenous peoples in the America's in  1537.  Forced displacement and systematic oppression was still okay.  Oh ... and of course Africans could still be enslaved.

Portugal banned the buying and selling of Chinese slaves in 1595.  Black slaves still super cool with them.

Russia abolished slavery in 1723.

Sierra Leone was founded by the British as a colony for freed slaves in 1787.  Domestic slavery, perpetuated by the wealthy, wasn't outlawed there until 1928.

Haiti declared independence from France in 1804, perhaps the only truly successful slave revolt in modern history.

The Abolition of the Slave Trade Act was passed in Britain in 1807. The United States banned the trade the following year though President Thomas Jefferson called Congress to make the slave trade illegal in 1806.  A slew of nations abolished slavery or slave trading in the decades that followed.

The last slaves were freed in Mexico in 1829, but when the Republic of Texas was established in 1836, it legalized slavery there.

President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, one of the most important executive orders in United States history.  It was followed by passage of the 13th amendment two years later.

Oklahoma, then Indian Territory, didn't abolish slavery until 1866.

In the 80 years following the British abolition of the slave trade, Brazil imported an additional 1 million African slaves and became the world's leading producer of coffee.  Slavery was finally abolished in Brazil in 1888.

The British, who had abolished the slave trade in 1807, continued using Indians as indentured servants on a large scale until 1917.  Many long-established Indian populations around the world began during this period of forced displacement.

Slavery continued legally in Ethiopia until 1942 when it was officially abolished by Emperor Haile Selassie.

Slavery was still legal in the nations of Saudi Arabia, Yemen, UAE, and Oman until the 1960s.

The most recent nations to make slavery a crime were Niger (2003) and Mauritania (2007).

Slavery is now officially illegal in all nations.  However, estimates suggest that more than 35 million people remain enslaved around the world.

Resources:

The Global Slavery Index - http://www.globalslaveryindex.org/findings/

The UN International Labor Organizatin - http://www.ilo.org

Go into all the world and Westernize it!

Writing of the Puritan era, David Bosch (Transforming Mission) spoke of a rather disturbing idea that was beginning to develop:

Cultural uplift as an aim of mission was still relatively undeveloped . . . . Western Christians believed that their culture was superior to those of non-Western nations, but they did not isolate cultural uplift as a goal of mission.  It was simply assumed that the people would live a better life once God's rule was established over their respective societies.  In John  Eliot's words, it was "absolutely necessary to carry on civility with religion". 


In the generations that followed however . . .

Some decades later Cotton Mather would formulate it even less unequivocally, "The best thing we can do for our Indians is to Anglicize them".  In the subsequent period . . . this view would sometimes be so dominant that it was hard to distinguish between mission and "Westernization."


How about now? What is the difference between the way you engage in mission and the practice of "Westernizing" or "Americanizing" others? Can you imagine the gospel lived out in non-Western forms? Do you think that is still the gospel? Is cultural uplift an legitimate aim of mission?

Point of View: William Carey at 250 - Florida Baptist Witness

Here's a nice little reflection on William Carey on his 250th birthday . . .

Point of View: William Carey at 250 - Florida Baptist Witness: "Contextualization refers to the need to communicate the Gospel in such a way that it speaks to the total context of the people to whom it is addressed. Carey knew the countercultural pull of biblical faith. He had great respect for the antiquity and beauty of the cultural legacy he encountered in India. Indeed, his translations and critical editions of the ancient Hindu classics contributed to what has been called an “Indian Renaissance.” At the same time, he was quite sure that devotion to those writings and the religions they had spawned could never lead to eternal life anymore than being born in England or America automatically made one a Christian. Carey’s ability to contextualize the Gospel without compromising the nonnegotiable essentials of biblical faith provides a balanced model for a truly evangelical missiology in our own age of social upheaval and cultural disillusion."

Something I wish I'd read a week ago . . .

Look, I'm cramming. I'll admit that. But in the process of trying to consume the last of my massive stack of Lausanne Congress advance papers, I came across something that I wish I had read at least a week ago.  That is, before entering into yet another brain-churning and heart-rending scuffle on the issue of contextualization. I'm going to refrain from commenting much further. Let me simply refer you to something surprising and great and then provide an extended quotation from it.

So, I encourage the planet earth to read Michael Herbst's article, "Witnessing to Christ in a Secular Culture." In it, he skillfully writes about the contemporary religious (or, that is non-religious) scene of especially eastern Germany.  He briefly describes the background and towards the end suggests some direction for a missional future.  But it is the meat in the middle that was so very compelling to me.  Why? Because I have said it again and again (although I'm sure that Herbst said it long before me). Honestly though, I am always so deeply encouraged to find another person who is hearing God say the same thing.  So, here's the quotation, speaking of the Lord Jesus' model of incarnational, boundary-crossing, contextual mission, Herbst begins to speak of Paul:

"This can be seen, for example in the Apostle Paul.  He is infected by the vision of Jesus, and is ready to put his own good completely on hold for the task of reaching people with the message of the gospel.  He does not want to ask any longer: What is dear to me, what is my tradition of living in the community of faith, what is my style of worshiping God? He wants to do everything that connects people to the gospel, and he wants to leave everything that could keep them away from the gospel, as long as it is really the message of Christ.  He wants to become all things to all people so that by all possible means he might save some (1 Corinthians 9:19-23)."

And a bit more:

"So I can only participate in the gospel when I join in with its dynamic movement towards people who have never heard of Jesus and still live their dismal lives without connection to him.  If I refuse to join in with this inclusive effort of the gospel, then I exclude myself from it.  A church should be a community on the move, crossing boundaries and making inclusion possible.  In theological language, I could say it like this: There is no mission without incarnation."

And then I wrote in the margin of my paper a big, all caps, 6-times underlined -- YES!!!

Peace to you this day.