This is what Christ looks like today

Note: this post was written 9/5, published 9/17.

My first thought when I see the photo of Aylan Kurdi, a Syrian child, face down and lifeless in the sand of a Turkish beach? My faith is pointless. My faith is naïve. My faith is irrelevant.

Every time it's like this. I have a momentary lapse in hope. Complete and utter defeat in the face of something so, so out of my reach. I think it's because I still cling to a fragment of my childhood understanding of faith and of Christ. My old understanding tells me that those who suffer need only eternal salvation. It leaves me hopeless. Because if I suffered as these Syrian refugees now do (and I don't, not even close), I would scoff at a Savior who offered heaven and that's it. It's absurd and disgusting how irrelevant that Christ is.

So I have to remind myself each time. Jesus' death on the cross is not relevant today because it promises salvation and eternal life. It is relevant because it points to injustice. Jesus knew what it was like to suffer at the hands of injustice. Those were the hands that put him on the cross. Right now, we are those people in the crowd, screaming, "Let him be crucified!" And when asked, "Why, what evil has he done?", we scream louder: "Let him be crucified!" because we have no other reason; injustice never makes any sense (Matthew 27:22-25, NRSV).

With these words, we take his blood upon us. And if we are silent? His blood is still upon us. 

The Christian faith has to be about Christ. And Christ was absolutely and entirely about facing injustice with compassion. He did the most compassionate thing, dying on a cross. I love that cross. Not because it saves me from eternal suffering in hell but because it saves me from myself--the hell I create for myself and the rest of the world when I do not choose compassion like Christ did and when I do not choose action on behalf of those who suffer hell on earth. The cross is what reminds me, when injustice causes people to anguish, that God is with us. He is there in that suffering. He suffered with the least of these and in so doing called the least of these Christ. We do not get to love Jesus without doing for the refugee what we would do for Jesus. It is simply not allowed.

And so, my faith is nothing if it does nothing for these Syrian refugees. Christ's death means nothing if his followers do nothing for children like Aylan. We, as Christians, are nothing in this world if we refuse to see that each person who suffers is Christ. Jesus is still relevant because he died and was found washed up on the shore of Turkey just three days ago. 

Others have made these calls to action, but I will repeat them for good measure: choose to be aware rather than ignore, donate to a responsible relief fund (Save the Children, World Vision), sign a petition, or two, or ten (White House dot Gov petition to welcome refugees to U.S.), and get your church or community to do the same.