Editorial: Missionary refugees

“They’re going to have hundreds of thousands of missionaries stuck in their country.”

Bill McDonough said those words during the recent Euro American Retreat in Germany. 

It was a slip of the tongue, actually. The former missionary was talking about fears in nations such as Hungary and Slovenia, where Middle Eastern refugees transit en route to Germany. Were Germany to shut its borders, these other countries would have refugees stuck on their soil. 

But McDonough’s inadvertent juxtaposition was providential, said Craig Young, a missionary in Marseilles, France, where the Church of Christ is serving Christian refugees from Syria. 

Can refugees also be missionaries?

“Yes! That is how we need to look at this picture,” Young said. “What if God is sending the refugees to Europe not to destroy her but to save her?”

While many shout for closed borders and increased security in response to Islamic terrorism, Churches of Christ in Europe are reaching out in love. They see in these Middle Eastern faces a disenchantment with Islam and a desire to follow Christ. 

May we support these efforts with guidance from our European brethren. May rebirth result, and may new generations of Middle Eastern Christians one day become missionaries to their homelands.

As McDonough said, “The greatest deterrent we can have to terrorism is to share the Gospel with these people … They’re coming to us.”