I am planning to visit Mike again soon and I remember on my last visit I met Mike’s neighbor who is filled with God’s Spirit. I remember leaving and thinking to myself how helpful it would be if someone from the local church could meet Samy and begin to visit with him as I have been with Mike.
Unfortunately, I simply don’t have enough days in the week to add another visit onto the calendar. I went away with the idea of trying to find someone from the local church who could begin to visit Samy. The purpose of these visits could be simply to help Samy learn German. This person could give Samy the Take-a-long German course and offer to meet once a week to review what he has been learning. I would recommend that they agree to meet 8-10 times for the tutoring. The options are unlimited.
At the very least, the church member could meet him and invite him to church. He could help Samy understand when and how to get there. He could offer to pick him up or to meet him. He could encourage him to come again and in a very small and doable way offer Samy the hope of getting to know fellow Christians.
So, I called the local pastor today in order to ask whether there might be someone interested in going with me on my next visit. I’d love to take someone along with me to meet Mike’s neighbor -Samy. I pulled over on the side of the road and rang up the pastor. “Does Samy speak German, because it might be hard to find someone if he doesn’t know the language?” I think the pastor was very aware that unfortunately the average person may not feel confident visiting a stranger in another langauge.
I think the key is to think outside of the box in order to make this kind of relationship work. This is about hospitality and reaching out in a genuine way. It’s about meeting the need of a stranger. In a recent UN report about reintegrating 400,000 refugees into local African communities, the writer identified the involvement in local churches as refugees, as a significant factor later in the success of starting life over (Kaun, 2009, p.27). I think the issues and points made in this article are comparable as well to refugees in Europe who one day may finally integrate into a new life. The connection to other people shapes the connection to a place
I hope the church will think about the kind of connection they can offer to refugees? The relationship that Samy needs is surely not the same kind that we might try to build with the neighbor next door whom we hardly know. There are dozens of options for extending to Samy our Christian hospitality and help. One of them might be simply to travel back and forth to church with hand signals, serve him a cup of tea and offer him the chance to be around other Christians for a few hours. If it is a God thing, I bet that Sammy will soon come on his own to church and eventually even learn a little German.