World Vision, the humanitarian relief organization, has crafted and sent to President Trump and Vice President Pence a stinging criticism of the President’s immigration policies. (To read the letter from World Vision, please click HERE.)

Calling for Christian compassion and the unmitigated acceptance of refugees, World Vision has missed a KEY biblical point, thus placing themselves in opposition to God and His word.

While it is the ministry of the church to act with compassion with respect to legitimate refugees, that is NOT the purpose of civil government! According to Romans 13, government exists for the purpose of enacting justice–the punishment of those who do evil and the praise of those who do good.

By extension, if justice is the role of government, then keeping the citizens of the nation safe is definitely a part of that God-ordained mandate. Thus keeping out of our nation those who are determined to harm us would be a given.

I Timothy 2:2, states that we are to pray for our leaders with this end in view–“that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life.” In other words, we pray for our leaders that they will fulfill their God-ordained duty to keep us safe, so that a “quiet and peaceable” life may become a reality.

When a President takes his God-ordained duty seriously, as well as his oath (“to protect against ALL enemies, foreign and domestic), we in the church community should NOT be criticizing him and calling on him to
take on/adopt the church’s responsibility. This is a matter of jurisdiction. The church operates in one arena of jurisdiction. Civil government operates in another. To superimpose the church’s jurisdictional responsibility on civil government, or vice versa, is to pervert, corrupt, disobey God’s clearly stated word.

Tragically, World Vision has done precisely that. In all candor, they should know better. Even more tragic are the 5000 plus pastors, ministry leaders, lay leaders, who’ve signed on to the letter to the President.

The appearance of the letter is designed to make it look as if they (World Vision) speak for ALL evangelicals/evangelical leaders in America. Let me assure you that they DO NOT! They definitely don’t speak
for me! The implication that they speak for all evangelicals is problematic to say the least. Their confusion about the church’s role versus the government’s role is unbiblical.

Dave Kistler
President, HOPE Ministries International/HOPE To The Hill
President, North Carolina Pastors Network (NCPN)
Co-host, Stand In The Gap Radio