When Scripture is Used to Harm

A Response to Megachurch Pastor’s Post on Immigration

Photo Credit: Reuters (used for critical commentary under fair use)

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Recently, Pastor Josh Howerton, a megachurch leader with a large online following, shared a post listing ten claims about Christianity and immigration he titled, “Christians, Borders, Illegal Immigration, & Deportation.” It presents “10 (difficult) thoughts” on why Christians should support strict immigration enforcement; and started with the same Reuters image, which I also feature at the top of this post.

I do not know Josh, and had never heard of him until I saw his post shared several times on social media. But having pastored churches, and as someone who has spent years with Scripture, I felt a moral and spiritual obligation to respond.

What follows is not an attack, but a point-by-point rebuttal grounded in Scripture, history, and the heart of the Gospel. I name him directly not to shame, but because truth deserves clarity, especially from those who are public teachers.

I weep with grief over the misuse of Scripture to condemn others and lift up empire. And while I know I will never have as many readers of this post as he had shares (18K+ shares on Facebook alone), I wanted there to be at least one response from someone who loves Christ and knows Scripture well enough to say: this is not the way.

In what follows, I quote him as he posted, and respond point-by-point (his words are italicized and throughout he is attributed as “the writer”).

He starts by writing:

With images like this floating around, it’s clear Christians are going to have to think Biblically about these issues.

Here are 10 (difficult) thoughts…

1. Christians as individuals are commanded to love immigrants (Lev 19:34), and should not let debates about IMMIGRATION POLICY erode their love for IMMIGRANTS as people.

But (wildly unpopular thoughts to come)…

This does NOT mean that Christians should oppose the enforcement of immigration laws or support mass immigration, because…

The writer correctly names that Scripture commands love of the immigrant (Leviticus 19:34), but then attempts to draw a sharp divide between personal compassion and public policy. This divide is not only artificial, it is unscriptural.

Throughout the Hebrew prophets, God’s concern is not merely individual behavior, but the behavior of nations, rulers, and societal systems. Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Micah all rail against institutionalized injustice. Their targets are corrupt courts, exploitative landlords, dishonest merchants, and rulers who oppress the poor and the alien.

Jesus continues this prophetic tradition. His most heated critiques are reserved not for “sinners,” but for religious and political leaders who uphold unjust systems. He calls out temple authorities who devour widows’ houses, he denounces the Pharisees for their legalism without mercy, and he overthrows tables in a temple turned into a marketplace; in the only place Gentiles could worship.

Love in Scripture is never confined to private acts of kindness. It is a public ethic. It is the measure by which laws, rulers, and nations are judged. As the prophets cried, “Woe to those who make unjust laws, to those who issue oppressive decrees” (Isaiah 10:1). When law becomes cruelty, when order becomes oppression, when policy inflicts fear upon families and trauma upon children, the gospel does not whisper compliance. It cries out for repentance, echoing Amos 5:24: “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream.”

Love is not soft sentiment. It is the fierce insistence that all people, regardless of status, bear the image of God. If a law terrorizes the vulnerable, love does not stand aside and say, “That’s just policy.” Love kneels down, lifts the broken, and stands in the way of the stones. A “Christian” who says any differently, and uses Scripture to be the foundation on which to do that, is at best woefully mistaken, and is at worst antichrist.

2. In the Bible, God establishes BORDERS, NATIONS, and WALLS.

// Divides the world into nations (Genesis 11)

// Establishes borders (Acts 17:26, Deut 32:8)

// Led his people to build walls to protect their borders (2 Chron 14:7, Psalm 51:18, 1 Kings 3:1, Nehemiah).

Now, that FEELS unloving, and we need to address that…

Yes, nations exist in Scripture. But to say God endorses nation-states as we know them is a leap. Genesis 11 tells the story of Babel not as a divine affirmation of separate peoples, but as a judgment against arrogant attempts to build a monolithic power. The scattering is not a blessing but a disruption of imperial pride.

In contrast, Pentecost in Acts 2 is the divine reversal of Babel. Where Babel confused languages to scatter, Pentecost celebrates many languages to unite. At Pentecost, people from every nation under heaven hear the gospel in their own tongue. Not erased, not assimilated, but honored. This is the vision of God’s Spirit poured out on all flesh (Joel 2:28–29), a foretaste of a kingdom where unity does not require uniformity.

Acts 17:26, often cited to justify borders, actually affirms the universal origin and dignity of humanity.

Paul proclaims that God made all nations from one ancestor, and set times and places not to divide them, but “so that they would search for God and perhaps grope for him and find him” (Acts 17:27). It’s a call to seek God in the midst of diversity, not police it.

And while walls existed in biblical times, they were symbols of fear and separation. The gospel moves in the opposite direction.

Ephesians 2:14 is explicit: Christ has broken down the dividing wall of hostility, making one new humanity. Revelation 21 describes the city of God with open gates that never shut (Revelation 21:25). Its security is not in walls, but in the presence of God and the light of the Lamb. The nations are not threats. They bring their glory into the city.

3. OBJECTION: “But building walls and enforcing immigration laws is hateful!”

No, nations build walls for the same reason you have a lock on your front door – not because you HATE the people on the outside, but because you LOVE the people on the inside.

The reason we have a legal immigration process is to vet who comes into the country, just like a good father vets who comes into their home.

Also…

This is a popular metaphor, but it misrepresents the biblical call. While it is true that Jesus, in certain parables, speaks of people being locked out of the kingdom (Matthew 25:10–12; Luke 13:25–27), those warnings are not about national security or immigration policy. They are about the ethical urgency of discipleship, the call to be ready, merciful, and just.

When Jesus explicitly describes what the kingdom of God is like, he compares it not to a locked house, but to a banquet open to the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the stranger (Luke 14:21–23). The doors are not secured to protect insiders but flung open to welcome outsiders. The Gospel reveals not a fortress mentality, but a feast mentality.

The metaphor of a locked door may seem appealing, especially to those afraid of chaos, but it falters under biblical scrutiny when real families are being torn apart. A locked door can indeed keep danger out; but in this case, it is keeping children from their parents, deporting long-standing neighbors, and criminalizing compassion. And Scripture is clear: “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it” (Hebrews 13:2).

What’s more (and in repeating myself), the entire movement of Pentecost is a divine undoing of Babel’s nationalistic fragmentation. Babel (Genesis 11) was about humanity attempting to secure its greatness through one language and one tower. A unifying impulse that resulted in scattering.

Pentecost (Acts 2) reverses that by honoring difference and declaring God’s message in every language. It is a radical vision of divine inclusion, not divine gatekeeping. In Pentecost, the Spirit does not demand assimilation or linguistic uniformity. The Spirit meets people where they are, and gathers them into one Body. That is the Christian response to the fear of difference: not walls, but welcome; not uniformity, but unity in love.

4. The United States allows (by far) the most legal immigrants per year of any nation in the world.

Of the Top 10 countries that allow the MOST legal immigrants per year in the world, we are #1 at 1M+ annually, nearly 250K more than #2 on the list.

This is why legal immigrants overwhelmingly support enforcement of immigration laws:

Because allowing illegal immigration without consequence is saying to all those who are legally waiting in line: “Suckers!”

That may be true statistically, but it does not exempt us from critique. Numbers do not determine morality. Moreover, the very existence of a long line does not justify cruelty toward those outside it.

Many immigrants cannot access the legal process due to danger, poverty, or the failures of our system. And the truth is, our economy relies on undocumented labor in industries ranging from agriculture to food service to elder care. These neighbors work, pay taxes, and live under constant fear, while being woven into the fabric of our shared life.

Scripture does not condition compassion on legality. The law of Moses demanded justice and care for the foreigner regardless of status: “You shall have the same rule for the foreigner and for the citizen: for I am the Lord your God” (Leviticus 24:22). Due process and just treatment are the promise of our Constitution and of biblical justice. Raids without warrants, detentions without cause, and deportations that tear families apart are violations not only of law, but of love.

The Bible never says to love only those who follow proper channels. It says, “love the sojourner, for you were sojourners” (Deuteronomy 10:19). No human law can erase the divine image. There is no border strong enough to separate us from our shared humanity, and there is no legal status that can unmake the image of God within each human being.

5. OBJECTION: “But the Bible commands us to ‘love the immigrant’ and ‘care for the sojourner’!”

Using that verse to oppose enforcement of immigration law is a reasoning error called “category confusion.”

The conversation is not about “loving immigrants.” It is about punishing criminals. The actions being taken have nothing to do with people being “immigrants” (which is why legal immigrants are not being deported).

The actions being taken are because people broke the law (and the Biblical role of the government is to punish crime, Rom 13:1-5)

This is where the writer attempts to separate love from justice, as if the biblical command to love the stranger can be set aside when the word “criminal” is invoked. But that is not how Scripture works, and certainly not how Christ moves.

Let us take Paul seriously. He wrote Romans from within the Roman Empire; an empire that would eventually execute him. The same Paul who exhorted Christians to honor authority also spent his life defying it when it opposed the Gospel. He was jailed, beaten, and eventually martyred.

When Paul refers to governing authorities as servants of God, he is not handing empire a blank check. He is offering a high and holy standard: rulers are to reward good and punish evil. But when they begin punishing good and protecting evil (as they often do) their vocation has been forfeited.

The writer claims that “legal immigrants are not being deported.” But the reality on the ground tells a different story: families are torn apart without due process, children are detained without cause, and veterans (yes, those who served this nation) have been deported despite their service. This is not the impartial execution of justice. It is systemic violence dressed in legal language.

Paul’s words in Romans 13 must be read alongside Acts 5:29, where Peter and the apostles say, “We must obey God rather than human beings.” They must be read with the knowledge that Paul himself refused silent compliance, appealing unjust rulings and standing for conscience above decree. His allegiance was never to Caesar. It was to Christ.

The Christian cannot bless laws that crush the vulnerable. The Christian cannot claim love while siding with power against the oppressed. Justice without love is not justice, it is cruelty with paperwork. And the Gospel was never meant to be the rubber stamp of empire. It is the fierce, liberating, world-reversing declaration that love is the law; and no badge or border can overrule it.

6. Illegal entry into the United States has been a federal crime since 1929 under 8 U.S. Code 1325: Improper Entry By Alien, and it’s not a victimless crime (like jaywalking)

In California alone, taxpayers spend $9.5 BILLION on healthcare for illegal immigrants.

And keep in mind, our nation is currently $37T in debt with financial analysts warning of the possibility of a catastrophic debt spiral

The claim reduces human beings to economic units and ignores the full ledger. Undocumented workers contribute billions in taxes and Social Security while remaining ineligible for most federal benefits. They are essential, not incidental, to the functioning of our economy.

Fields are harvested, roofs are raised, meals are served, and vulnerable bodies are cared for by hands that bear no legal protection. Our economic engine runs on the backs of immigrants, both documented and not.

The sin is not their presence, it is our willingness to benefit from their labor while denying them safety, dignity, or belonging…

and then having the audacity to complain about how much one state pays to at least heal them?

Sweet Jesus in heaven shaking his thorn-scared, Roman-crowned head.

Scripture sees this clearly. Jeremiah condemns the king who builds his house without justice, by forcing his neighbors to labor without fair wages. The prophets are not fooled by prosperity built on hidden suffering. God measures nations not by GDP but by whether the poor eat and the stranger rests. And the laws of Moses demand that justice and care be shown to all within the land, not just citizens, for all are made in the image of God. There is no human statute that can erase divine worth. If we cling to laws that criminalize the very hands that feed us, it is not immigration that will topple us, but the judgment that comes for those who forget compassion.

7. OBJECTION: “But Christians should want LOVING government leaders, and loving leaders would WANT to care for people!”

Yes, but in the Bible leaders are called to prioritize the people God has placed under their leadership over people who are not under their leadership.

If a Dad cares for other people’s kids in a way that harms his own kids, that doesn’t make him a good man, it makes him a terrible father. If a nation’s leaders care for another nations’ citizens in a way it harms its own citizens, that doesn’t make them merciful people, it makes them terrible leaders in dereliction of duty.

Jesus redrew the borders of family. Not by blood or nation, but by the bond of compassion. He said his family is made up of those who do God’s will, and in the parable of the good Samaritan, he shattered every boundary we try to build around belonging. In that story, the one who acted as neighbor was the one most despised by the system, the one outsiders feared and insiders dismissed. Yet mercy, not proximity or status, marked the true kin.

A father who is good teaches his children not to hide behind locked doors, but to open them. He teaches them to break bread, not just protect it. He teaches them to see the humanity in every face, not label others as threats. And a leader worthy of the name must do likewise. Earthly power reflects divine goodness only when it lifts the lowly, defends the forgotten, and shelters the stranger with the same tenderness it shows to its own. This is the littered throughout the prophets, the Law, the apostles, and our Lord!

It is not enough to invoke the Divine while ignoring the stranger at the gate. Psalm 146 declares that God sustains the orphan and the widow and watches over the foreigner. Not from a distance, but with fierce, attentive care. Any nation claiming to honor God must be measured by how it mirrors that same fierce care. Not in abstraction, but in policy, practice, and public witness. And, if the nation doesn't claim God, than those within it who do shall be judged accordingly.

8. Response to the "JESUS WAS AN IMMIGRANT" thing:

-Jesus never broke immigration laws

-His family traveled to legally register themselves in a national census (Luke 2:1-5)

-Jesus did not “immigrate”: He left Nazareth (in the Roman Empire) to go to Egypt (also in the Roman Empire)

-Jesus commanded obedience to laws (Rom 13:1)

-People like to selectively-edit Jesus to turn him into a mascot for their cause. You can equally say things like, “Jesus never left his home country, Jesus was unvaccinated, Jesus fed the poor without raising taxes, Jesus told people to buy weapons, etc”

Jesus is a Lord, not a mascot.

The author wrongly attributes Jesus as the speaker of Romans 13, when in fact it is Paul who wrote it. And wrongly claims Jesus left Nazareth to go to Egypt, when in fact he went from Bethlehem to Egypt.

That aside, Matthew tells us the holy family fled across regional lines to escape a murderous king. They sought asylum in Egypt. The writer says Jesus did not cross the borders of empire, but even a cursory reading reveals the dishonesty of that claim. Though Egypt remained under Roman control, the flight to Egypt took the child Jesus outside Herod’s jurisdiction, beyond the reach of his murderous decree. In today’s terms, the holy family fled from a regional tyrant to a distant part of empire, and found temporary sanctuary there.

Now the story repeats. But in this version, America plays Herod, and Herod plays Caesar. There is no Egypt to flee to. No border wide enough. No city of refuge untouched by ICE. When veterans are detained on their way to the VA, when children are taken from their beds in the night, when sanctuary cities become hunting grounds for agents without warrants... this is not order, it is empire run amok.

Jesus crossed every kind of border: legal, cultural, ritual, social. He healed on the Sabbath. He touched the untouchable. He entered Samaria though the pious walked around it. He did not respect authority when that authority contradicted mercy. The slaughter of the innocents was the first act of resistance he survived.

And still, his life, his teaching, his death, and resurrection, all of it declares: the Son of Man is Lord, even of the law. However, it seems the writer might have more interest in Jesus as mascot than the Lord, as Jesus is simply called “a Lord” here anyway.

9. Response to protestors using this verse: “You shall not mistreat a foreigner nor oppress them.” (Exod. 22:21)

Yes and amen! But…

-The Bible also requires the “foreigner” to obey the laws of the land (Numbers 15:15-16), which includes immigration laws

-It is not mistreatment to ensure the number of “foreigners” does not become harmful to the people of the nation.

And, nobody ever seems to bring up this verse (#10)...

The Torah text the writer mentions from Numbers demands one law for both native and foreigner. A shared standard meant to protect, not to purge. The command is not a blank check for expulsion, but a prophetic summons to fairness. The prophets rail against unequal weights and measures, against systems that crush the outsider while excusing the insider. And what are our laws today, if not weighted with inequity? When a mother is deported for a broken taillight while a corporation launders millions unpunished, the scales are shattered.

Let us be honest: there are not equal laws in this land. There are laws for those with wealth and lawyers, and laws for those with no papers and no recourse. There are laws that criminalize skin color, accent, and poverty. And when those laws are applied with greater force against the vulnerable, they betray the very justice they claim to uphold. Scripture sees this clearly. Jesus warns of those who tithe mint and dill and cumin but neglect the weightier matters of justice, mercy, and faithfulness.

The writer quotes Scripture as though it were a hammer. But the law was meant to be a staff, to guide, not to bludgeon. And when it is turned into a weapon against the stranger, it becomes an idol.

Jesus never confused legality with righteousness. He saw through the legalism of his day to the hearts hardened beneath. When the law forgets mercy, it forfeits its moral claim. When the law crushes the stranger, the orphan, and the widow, it invites the judgment of God. A judgment not upon the foreigner, but upon the nation that calls itself faithful while closing the door on the ones God loves most.

10. We must also be careful not to pick and choose which verses of the Old Testament we apply and do not apply to modern immigration discussions.

This was also a warning God gave to the people of Israel that is rarely discussed:

“Foreigners who live in your land will gain more and more power, while you gradually lose yours. They will have money to lend you, but you will have none to lend them. In the end they will be your rulers.” (Deut. 28:43)

To invoke Deuteronomy twenty-eight as proof of God’s wrath through immigration is a misreading so severe it borders on theological malpractice. The curses of Deuteronomy fall upon Israel itself when it turns from justice and forsakes the orphan, the widow, and the stranger.

The warning is inward, not outward. It is not the arrival of others that signals collapse; it is the corrosion of covenant, the abandonment of compassion, and the worship of power over mercy. The point of the text is the ways of foreigners will take over from the ways of God if the ways of God aren’t honored.

This is not new. Scripture tells of kings who built monuments while the poor starved, of nations that trusted in chariots rather than the Holy One, of temples so gilded in gold that they forgot the God who dwelled among the tents of exiles. And every time, the prophets came. Not to blame the foreigner, but to confront the faithful who had forgotten their faith.

The prophet Isaiah sang of a day when nations will stream to the mountain of the Lord. Not to be judged, but to be taught peace. And in that song, swords become plowshares. It is not a warning of invasion, but a vision of communion.

And it is echoed in the end of all things, where Revelation does not speak of walled borders or exclusion zones, but of gates that never close and a city healed by the leaves of a tree, for the healing of the nations.

Pentecost undoes Babel not by fear, but by fire. The tongues of flame fall not to scatter, but to gather. And in every language, the glory of God is spoken. This is not divine judgment through migration. It is divine presence within migration. It is the Holy Spirit inhabiting every border crossed in hope. It is Christ himself who said, “I was a stranger, and you welcomed me” (Matthew 25:35).

FINAL WORD

DON'T let debates about immigration policy harden your hearts toward immigrants.

DON'T get gaslit into supporting disorder.

LOVE PEOPLE.

AND GRACIOUSLY OPPOSE LAWLESSNESS.

This post was Christian nationalism, pure and simple, guised in biblical citations and love of empire. Christian nationalism always begins the same way; with fear disguised as faith, and control baptized as conviction.

But it always ends the same way too; with repentance. Every age in which the Church fused its altar with empire has later wept over the cost. We must not wait for history to indict us. We must remember now: it is not immigration that topples a nation. It is indifference. It is cruelty. It is the refusal to love the ones whom Christ still walks alongside on dusty roads, seeking shelter, welcome, and peace.

The writer warns against disorder. But Scripture warns us more fiercely against the cold machinery of loveless order. Order without justice is Pharaoh’s brick tally. It is Pilate washing his hands. It is the stoning crowd demanding silence from the weeping Christ.

Paul says the law is fulfilled in love.

Not stability, not compliance, not control, but love.

A love with calloused hands and tear-streaked cheeks.

A love that does not merely soothe the wounded but stands between them and the sword.

A love that unseats kings and lifts up the lowly.

A love that sings freedom into the chains of every unjust policy.

If the Church is afraid of disorder, let it be afraid of the disorder that comes when love is choked out by comfort. Let it fear the silence that deafens the cries of the detained, the deported, and the disappeared. Let it tremble before a Gospel reduced to gatekeeping.

For Christ is still Lord, and Caesar is still not. That is the line drawn in the sand. And we who claim his name must draw it again with our lives.

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