Here is a long quote from my book, Integrated Justice and Equality (Acton Institute, 2014). It was written long before Presidents Trump or Biden came along and disagreed, for very different reasons, with much of what I wrote as I did not deal with almost fully open or closed borders. That chapter did not allow for the New Testament’s encouragement to accept all people (Jesus), Gentiles (Paul), and strangers (James). The political climate today may be polarizing, but biblical precepts stand over every culture, and biblical precepts contradict much in every culture. It is true of immigration as well as more personal (and politicized) issues.
“Steve Jobs, not long before he died in 2011, asked President Obama to ease immigration for foreign graduates of American universities so that Apple could hire them more easily. Jobs was not at all pleased with the president’s answer.
“There is a fundamental resistance in the United States to immigration, even though nearly every American is either an immigrant or the descendant of immigrants. Immigration is one of many issues related to lifting the poor, and it is also a matter of compassion, justice, and biblical teaching.
“Why People Migrate to America: Elevating the poor from poverty requires the foundation of a stable society that is under the rule of law and free from civil war—a society that embraces the benefits, including private property, of the Industrial and Democratic Revolutions. Once these conditions are met, people will be sufficiently free to see their hard work and innovative ideas lift them from poverty.
“These conditions, however, are rare in the poorest parts of the world, known as the nations of the Bottom Billion. This rarity helps explain why the people of those nations continue in severe poverty. It also helps explain why so many emigrate from poor nations to work at low-paying jobs in the developed world. Many of these people send substantial portions of their earnings back home to help their families. Globally the total is around $300 billion.
“Political or Biblical Thinking? Treating the aliens among us well is an act of compassion that is both biblically grounded (see Malachi 3:5) and part of America’s heritage. Yet today, for some reason, those who believe the Scriptures resist immigration. Resistance to the illegal immigration of criminals is understandable, but resistance to the immigration of workers—and the ethnic labeling that often accompanies it—is not.
“One of the most surprising concepts in the Old Testament is its insistence on caring for aliens. Zechariah 7:10 is exceptionally clear:”Do not oppress the widow or the fatherless, the foreigner or the poor. Do not plot evil against each other.”
“Israel was surrounded by enemy nations whose people believed in fundamentally false gods, yet aliens from those very nations were to be cared for along with Israelite widows and orphans. Abraham came to the land as an alien (Genesis 28:4), and the good treatment of foreigners was codified as soon as the Decalogue was given (see Exodus 12:48–49; 22:21; 23:9 and 48 other references in the Pentateuch).
“The book of Ruth is the story of how Ruth the Moabitess, the widow of an Israelite, not only was accepted in Israel but also married Boaz. And this couple became ancestors of King David and thus of the Messiah himself (Ruth 4:18–22). No alien was ever more embraced than Ruth. We can see that biblical justice and compassion were vitally integrated in the case of an alien who was lifted not only from poverty but, to a great and deep degree, was made spiritually significant.
“Immigration is both good for the receiving country and helps ease rural and urban poverty at home. People in the diasporas do not just send money home; they send ideas, and they hire people when they create businesses after returning home. The amount of brainpower released in India by graduates of American universities is staggering, and it happens specifically in India, partly because these grads cannot get jobs in America. This is what frustrated Steve Jobs.” (pp. 99-100, 109).