“Undocumented Citizens”?

If you keep up with national news, you have seen several stories in the last week about immigration and illegal aliens. This is not a new issue, of course, but it continues to fuel debate and polarize the nation. Currently, there are 11 million people living in the United States illegally.

I was listening to a discussion about this on NPR the other day. The same tired arguments were being trotted out by proponents and opponents of a “pathway to citizenship.” The same responses were being offered and the same logical fallacies were being exploited. I was starting to fade out when I heard a term I had not heard before, one that caused my jaw to drop. The term was “undocumented citizens.”

I would like to believe I have kept up with current events. I have heard the terms “undocumented workers” used to refer to “illegal aliens,” and I have observed the mainstream media’s bias away from referring to such immigrants as “illegals,” but this was the first time I had ever heard a politician on the national stage refer to them as “undocumented citizens.” What? Are you kidding me? Have we entered some sort of cognitive wonderland in which contradictory terms can be united into a new truth? Good grief.

And this is where I want to head for a few moments. All politics aside, this issue highlights something Francis Schaeffer observed many years ago as he identified a societal, psychological, and spiritual ‘line of despair’ which society had approached and crossed during the twentieth century. Ultimately it was the widespread acceptance of the possibility that a proposition “A” and a proposition “non-A” could both be true. This constituted the rejection of antipathy and the acceptance, if you will, of nonsense as sense.

The average person doesn’t live his or her life in accordance with such semantics, of course. The nuts-and-bolts of real life would not permit it. Either the spark plug fits into the engine or it doesn’t. It can’t belong in the engine and simultaneously not belong. The computer is either on or off. It is not both. No, in the real world, antithesis rules. But in the nether world of abstract reasoning, however, folks seem to believe magic happens and the impossible is possible.

And here is where I want to, as my wife says, ‘get preachy.’

This mentality seems to have penetrated the religious minds of many Americans concerning the afterlife. While the vast majority of Americans affirm a belief in the afterlife and in a heaven, they reject an absolutist statement concerning citizenship in heaven. It seems they want to believe that both documented citizens and undocumented citizens will be there. But what does the Bible say?

The Bible affirms that humans have long sought to enter into the heavenly kingdom, and it affirms that most have sought to do it in their own ways and on their own terms. And the Bible declares that this method is doomed to failure. The righteousness demanded of citizens of the kingdom is not attainable through works, it is attainable only by the grace of God through faith. The righteousness required is perfection, and this perfection is only attainable by being credited by Almighty God with the righteousness of Christ and subsequently being conformed into His image by the power of the Holy Spirit.

But won’t there be any “undocumented citizens” in the Kingdom of God?

No, the Scriptures are clear that only those whose names have been recorded in the Book of Life will enter the Kingdom of God. Those whose names have not been recorded will be sent to that place reserved for the devil and his angels. This reality is taught by Jesus, with other words, as he explains to Nicodemus the necessity of new birth in the third chapter of John. This new birth, that which coincides with the receiving of Jesus, grants one a position of a son of God, an heir of the Kingdom.

There are more Scriptures we could look at, but you get the point. When Paul speaks of “our citizenship in heaven,” he is referring to a legal standing before God, documented and realized, in the past, in the present and in the future.

Now, personally, having said all that, I don’t get overly concerned about this world’s politics. My stay here is short, and my calling is to labor on behalf of my eternal home. So, honestly, I can observe this issue concerning illegal immigration in the United States and move on. I won’t lose a lot of sleep over it. But I, we, as Christians, cannot ignore the implications of this sort of thinking on the proclamation of the Gospel. We must eschew the relativism of this age and stand firm in the absolutist truths proclaimed in the Bible. Jesus is the Way. Entrance into the Kingdom of God is dependent on a relationship with the Father through Him. Jesus must be proclaimed, heard, and received. We must stand firm in the midst of this evil generation and proclaim that there will be no ‘non-documented citizens’ in Glory. Amen?