Feet Fitted with the Gospel of Peace

(Clockwise from top left: Welcomia, Denis Tangney Jr, captain_galaxy, YT, all via Getty Images)

Feet Fitted with the Gospel of Peace 

A prayer walk, a prophetic dream, and a call to stand with our immigrant brothers and sisters

by Sarah Blumenshine, Director, Intercultural Ministries

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One of the beauties of my work is connecting deeply with immigrant communities in and around Boston. This summer I’ve been attending regular morning prayer calls led by the Agencia ALPHA team over Zoom. On a recent call, Pastor Sergio Perez of Harvest Ministries in Weymouth invited us to join an upcoming prayer walk in the city of Lynn. About a dozen of us showed up the following Saturday. Pastors joined hands with families and seniors. We were all there for one purpose: to pray protection and blessing over the city.

Before we broke into groups and began our walk, Pastor Sergio shared a dream he’d had more than 15 years ago. This dream took place on a particular street corner in Lynn. Exactly what is happening now across the country was playing out in his dream. Officers were rounding up immigrants and loading them into a bus. Families were terrified, trying to get away. In his dream, Pastor Sergio approached the officers and told them that they needed to take care. He asserted that immigrants have dignity and humanity and deserve decency. The officers seemed to pause and were somewhat affected, and then Pastor Sergio woke up. The dream felt so real that it stuck with him.

When we paired off and picked a direction to walk, Pastor Sergio headed in the direction of the street corner he’d seen in his dream. I teamed up with Patricia Sobalvarro, Executive Director of Agencia ALPHA, and Pastora Ramonita Mulero of Iglesia Hispana de la Comunidad. Together we began walking toward a nearby Market Basket grocery store, where many immigrants find employment. We prayed through Ephesians 6:10-18 about putting on the armor of God, asking for truth, for faith, for the protection that comes not from our own efforts but from the astonishing goodness of God.

Something struck me that I’d not seen before. I’ve always associated this passage with spiritual defense. But this time, the instruction to stand firm “with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace,” landed in a fresh way. Even in battle against spiritual darkness, we are told to wear shoes that can bear us quickly elsewhere to share the good news of peace! Such hope, even certainty. 

As we walked, we passed immigrant-owned shops, houses, and apartments. We recalled the passage in Exodus where God told the Israelites to paint the blood of a lamb over their doorframes as a sign for the angel of death to pass, thereby sparing their firstborn sons. We covered homes and businesses and sidewalks and churches with pleas for physical protection, praying that violence would pass them by.

Patricia shared a reflection on the story of the Israelites finally expelled from Egypt, only to have Pharaoh change his mind. He sent chariots and soldiers to pursue and enslave them again. Meanwhile, the Israelites were approaching the Red Sea with nowhere to go. Patricia remarked that she has often wondered how she would have felt had she experienced that moment. Every step closer to an impassable body of water would have seemed like impending death. When things seemed most desperate, God made a preposterous way through the sea. We prayed for these kinds of miracles, admitting we could see no way through, but God surely could.

“Put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes, you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything, to stand. Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.”

— Ephesians 6:13-15

When we returned to the church parking lot, each group offered a few words about their experience. Another pastor who was present started sharing, first to the whole group, and then he turned and spoke specifically to me. Because I am still learning Spanish, I only understood a fraction of his testimony, but I know our hearts saw each other. He spoke with deep passion, such that he started weeping.

When the pastor finished speaking, Pastor Sergio asked how much I had understood. Seeing my uncertainty, he kindly translated the pastor’s words. He explained that my presence—and what I represent as a U.S.-born citizen—carried a certain weight. He related how many immigrants feel isolated and unseen by others. They feel invisible to their Christian brothers and sisters in this country. The fact that someone from that context would see their suffering and journey with them was overwhelming to the pastor who shared. Pastor Sergio compared it to the story of the British politician William Wilberforce, who, despite his privilege and comforts, identified with the plight of enslaved people and became an advocate for the ending of slavery.

I was stunned. I hadn’t done anything extraordinary; I had simply shown up to pray, side by side with my sisters and brothers. Truthfully, it felt like the bare minimum my spiritual siblings should expect. Jesus told us to love one another as we love ourselves. Geography, international boundaries, human laws—these are all important. But not one of them stops us from being part of the same family, the same body.

“The parts of the body will not take sides,” Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 12:25-26. “All of them will take care of one another. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it. If one part is honored, every part shares in its joy.”

Lately, I’ve had an image in my head of the Church in the United States as a human body suffering from neuropathy. Our nervous system, the network that carries sensation and information and generates feedback, is damaged. Our ability to perceive one another is scrambled. I imagine someone standing next to a hot stove, hand on the burner, completely unaware that skin and tissue are melting until they smell the burning—but by then, the damage is done.

Friends, parts of the body of Christ are on fire. I do not exaggerate. I am one nerve that transmits impulse and effect. I bear witness to that agony. We are poor in relationships that cross cultural lines. Our relational distance allows us to dehumanize the “other.” We forget that we’re kin. We fail to see that our thriving is enmeshed.

“This body of Christ desperately needs healing. It is at war with itself. Healing starts within each one of us. What kind of fruit am I nurturing with the substance of my soul? In the communities I am part of, are we together seeking the flourishing of all people?”

The current level of chaos in the federal government is a smoke screen that further obscures our view. Some of us have swallowed the lie that law and punishment are righteous, but compassion is only for those who deserve it. This falsehood is antithetical to the life and ministry of Jesus.

Laws have their purpose in a well-functioning society, to be sure. If we are fueled by love and joy, filled with the fruit of the Spirit, we will work with others to correct immoral laws and apply them with fairness. 

In contrast, today the fruit of our policies and power is on grotesque display. Every human being suffering in a detention camp with no legal recourse, every person deported to a country that is not their own, each careless arrest, every child who cries for their missing parents—these we cannot brush off as collateral damage. They are the fruit of fear, resentment, self-righteousness, and a will to dominate. They are what happens when laws are weaponized as instruments of oppression.

This body of Christ desperately needs healing. It is at war with itself. Healing starts within each one of us. What kind of fruit am I nurturing with the substance of my soul? In the communities I am part of, are we together seeking the flourishing of all people?

We remember our kinship by listening to one another. We dedicate the time and attention required to understand each other. We choose to take simple but significant steps, such as joining our hearts in prayer. These habits are transformative, and they give rise to new points of connection that slowly help us repair what has been broken.

As we commit ourselves to this way of life, everyone doing their part, honoring one another’s pain and celebrating each other’s joys, we begin to experience the body as God intended. God’s design is for the Church to be an agent of hope, healing, and reconciliation both within and without. May it be so.

How human migration exposes what’s in our hearts

(Clockwise from top left: Igancio Martin Martin, 4FR, northwoodsphoto, jordachelr, all via Getty Images)

How human migration exposes what’s in our hearts

Migrants, Christians, and Jesus

Many years ago, Sarah Blumenshine helped a young family from Iraq settle into a new life in the United States. They didn’t have a stroller for their child, so Sarah thought perhaps the day had finally come to part with the beloved stroller she had wheeled her kids around when they were young.

Sarah thought this refugee family would treasure the stroller as much as she had. She fantasized about the moment she would give it to them (think Hollywood): a beam of light comes down on them as she passes the stroller onto the next generation.

But movies are not reality. It was a big, heavy stroller that would be difficult to carry up and down three floors in the family’s new apartment. 

“When they moved from a shelter situation into their apartment, and I was going back to clean things up—make sure nothing had been left behind—you know what I found?”

What’s motivating you?

This experience is typical for volunteers stepping into the lives of immigrants and refugees, eager to help. When she saw the stroller, Sarah was in total shock. And then she just had to laugh at herself.

“It was totally about me, it was not about them and what they actually needed,” Sarah told Caleb McCoy on Emmanuel Gospel Center’s Curious City podcast. “If we can be eyes wide open about those things and even have a sense of humor when they happen—not if but when—that’s one thing that I think makes a big difference in our ability to relate to other people.”

Volunteers confronted for the first time with the depth of the pain of the refugee experience feel powerless to do anything. They want to be helpful. They want to be the hands and feet of Jesus. But there are no quick fixes. 

“It’s actually freeing to know that our job is not to fix, our job is to show up,” Sarah said. “We try to show up as much as our best selves as possible and then we have to be open-handed about what happens from there.”

“It’s actually freeing to know that our job is not to fix, our job is to show up. We try to show up as much as our best selves as possible and then we have to be open-handed about what happens from there.”

— Sarah Blumenshine

This dynamic is a lived experience for Sarah as the Director of Intercultural Ministries at the Emmanuel Gospel Center. She has been working as a bridge between churches and immigrant-led organizations for many years. 

The combination of tenacity and tenderness she sees in the immigrant-led space inspires her. Every day these leaders resolve to retain their humanity and joy in the midst of complex challenges and daunting obstacles. 

Who’s shaping your immigration politics?

Over the years, Sarah has seen immigration go from enjoying bipartisan support to succumbing to the politics of fear and suspicion. She acknowledges that getting the information to formulate a sound perspective on the issue is challenging. There’s a lot of noise. And much of it is geared to press our buttons. 

But as Christians, we want to see people the way Jesus sees them. At a basic level, that means seeing them as human beings. That can become challenging when we’re talking politics, but Christians can separate immigration policy from the biblical mandate to love our neighbors as ourselves. 

“I’m talking about the reality that there are people here, and we can either objectify them and weaponize them to achieve a political statement of one kind or another, or we can see them as who they are: as humans, as loved by God,” Sarah said. “We can treat them accordingly: as lovingly and fairly as we know how.” 

There are steps we can take to live as faithful followers of Jesus in our current political climate: 

Slow down. 

Take a step back. 

Reflect on your motivations. 

Name the things you fear. 

Interrogate them. 

Is someone trying to push your buttons for their own agenda?  

“You can come down however you want on policy, but I’m of the persuasion that as followers of Jesus, we do have a biblical mandate, we have a responsibility to love our neighbors,” Sarah said. “These are literally our neighbors: they are people in our cities, in our communities, in our state, in our country. It’s not optional for us.”  

For this and more on Sarah’s conversation with Caleb McCoy, listen to the Curious City episode, “Make Me A Sanctuary … City?”

EGC’s (Inaugural) Shalom-Seekers Book List

EGC’s (Inaugural) Shalom-Seekers Book List

Liza Cagua-McAllister for EGC staff

The Emmanuel Gospel Center (EGC) exists to catalyze kingdom-centered, systemic change for the shalom of the city and the glory of God. If you are also on this amazing mission, our staff recently put together a list of books that have influenced and helped us along this challenging journey!

We asked our team: What books from diverse authors have you read that have contributed meaningfully to your shalom-seeking in the urban context? Why were these books significant to you? 

Submissions ranged from systems thinking primers to books on racial healing, from urban ministry classics to challenging new works less than a year old. From the 28 books mentioned by our team, we selected about a dozen to display in our EGC breakroom. Here are a few of those noteworthy titles, with staff comments.

“I find this book important for shalom-seeking in the urban context because... ”

A Multitude of All Peoples 

A Multitude of All Peoples: Engaging Ancient Christianity's Global Identity by Vince L. Bantu (2020) 

In order to know where we are headed, we need to know where we’ve been. Dr. Bantu — a former EGC staff member — brilliantly challenges Western mental models and makes the case for how the Church’s very foundation is multicultural.

Buried Seeds

Buried Seeds: Learning from the Vibrant Resilience of Marginalized Christian Communities by Alexia Salvatierra and Brandon Wrencher (2022)

Rev. Dr. Salvatierra and Rev. Wrencher glean powerful learnings from faith communities facing brutal challenges and evidencing tremendous power and imagination! From these historic movements, they offer present-day applications to different audiences, which is very helpful given urban shalom-seekers’ diverse experiences and social locations.

The Color of Compromise

The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby (2020)

Dr. Tisby offers an eye-opening and thoughtful account of how the Church has been complicit in creating and maintaining the unjust structures of systemic racism in America. This is an important book for understanding one of the key issues of our times.

Ecosystems of Jubilee

Ecosystems of Jubilee: Economic Ethics for the Neighborhood by Adam Gustine and José Humphreys III (2023)

The authors richly engage Scripture to address the relationship between justice and economics, which is so central to making things right in our world. We can’t really live out the gospel without having it reshape our economic ethics, and this is a great beginning!

Seek the Peace of the City

Seek the Peace of the City: Reflections on Urban Ministry by Dr. Eldin Villafañe (1995)

Dr. Villafañe applies the “Jeremiah paradigm” for ministry in the city, laying the biblical and theological groundwork for engaging issues such as violence and reconciliation in the city with the wisdom and truth of God’s word.  

Thinking in Systems

Thinking in Systems: A Primer by Donella H. Meadows (2008) 

We work in a complex web of interrelated living systems. Understanding systems is fundamental to our work, and this is the classic primer on what systems are and why they matter. It’s a great starting point or great refresher for your systems journey.

Other titles you can find in the EGC breakroom:

• Beholding Beauty: Worshiping God through the Arts by Jason McConnell (2022) 

• Beyond Welcome: Centering Immigrants in our Christian Approach to Immigration by Karen González (2022) 

• First Nations Version: An Indigenous Translation of the New Testament trans. by Terry M. Wildman with consultant editor First Nations Version Translation Council (2021)

• Healing Racial Trauma: The Road to Resilience Paperback by Sheila Wise Rowe (2020)  

• I Bring the Voices of My People: A Womanist Vision for Racial Reconciliation by Chanequa Walker-Barnes (2019) 

• The Alternative: Most of What You Believe About Poverty is Wrong by Mauricio Miller (2017)

• The Anatomy of Peace: Resolving the Heart of Conflict by The Arbinger Institute (2006)

Come by EGC to borrow one of these copies, check them out at your local library, or purchase them at your local, independent bookstore through bookshop.org!

These books help us pursue the shalom of the city for the glory of God. How about you?