Long before my family knew the word “evangelical,” we encountered its witness. Refugees like my father and displaced souls like my mother met followers of Jesus in Korea who came “to proclaim good news to the poor … to set the oppressed free.” They came in word and deed, with a tender but tenacious faith, irrepressible hope and inexpressible joy.

When my parents immigrated to the United States in 1965, a Lutheran minister helped them settle. We lived in the basement of an Irish Catholic family in the Bronx and found spiritual refuge in a Korean Presbyterian church. Their story is not unique. It is echoed in the lives of millions whose labor feeds our tables and heals our bodies — immigrants who harvest crops, stock shelves, care for the sick and serve in countless unseen ways.

Scripture calls the Church “strangers and sojourners.” This is not metaphor; it is memory. Abraham, though wealthy, called himself a foreigner and stranger. Jesus, born under occupation, fled as a refugee and declared, “My kingdom is not of this world.” In Christ, we follow a migrant Savior.

Faith is a pilgrimage. We are resident aliens, longing for a better country — a heavenly one. Hebrews reminds us that those who live by faith admit they are foreigners on earth, seeking a city prepared by God.

Today, as we face complex questions about immigration, we must remember: The Church is a migrant people. Our true home is in Christ. Our values are shaped by another reality. And our calling is to welcome the stranger, because we are strangers too.

Walter Kim

Walter Kim became the president of the National Association of Evangelicals in January 2020. He previously served as a pastor at Boston’s historic Park Street Church and at churches in Vancouver, Canada and Charlottesville, Virginia, as well as a campus chaplain at Yale University. He preaches, writes and engages in collaborative leadership to connect the Bible to the intellectual and cultural issues of the day. He regularly teaches in conferences and classrooms; addresses faith concerns with elected officials and public institutions; and provides theological and cultural commentary to leading news outlets. He serves on the boards of Christianity Today and World Relief and consults with a wide range of organizations. Kim received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, his M.Div. from Regent College in Vancouver, and his B.A. from Northwestern University.