Would you be surprised if I told you that Americans are increasingly inhospitable to international visitors and that Christians can thank God for that? One university reports that 80 percent of their international students never see the inside of a local U.S. home. Longer-term immigrants seem to fare little better.
So why can Christians thank God? If unbelievers have lost interest in showing hospitality to foreigners, we have all the more opportunity! We can welcome foreigners, show compassion, and so commend the gospel right here in America.
Some numbers will illustrate the scale of this opportunity. Since 1970 more than 35 million individuals have immigrated to the United States. And that’s not counting the more than 700,000 college students who come here to study each year or the millions of illegal immigrants living in the shadows of our cities and towns.
You don’t need to live in New York or Los Angeles to reach out to newcomers. The largest community of Kurdish people in America is in Nashville, Tennessee. The biggest community of Somalis is in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Springfield, Virginia hosts the second largest community of Afghans in the Western Hemisphere.
