Jason Lee, Director, Acts 17 initiative, and MiP Contributor

Ed Stetzer has been known as an evangelical leader that has been a faithful and prophetic voice to U.S. churches to embrace the Biblical call to serve, minister to, and speak for vulnerable immigrants and refugees.

We, at the Acts 17 Initiative, were able to chat briefly with Ed Stetzer today about how evangelicals in the U.S. need to respond to the refugee crisis, refugee resettlement in the U.S., the immigration debate, and the current focus on a permanent legislative fix for Dreamers (a.k.a. DACA recipients) in the U.S.

Here are two 3 minute videos of that conversation.

Question 1: Dr. Stetzer, in light of the worldwide refugee crisis, 2 years ago you put together the GC2 Summit: to help Evangelicals consider ways to respond to the refugee crisis. Part of Evangelicals response is serving refugees through refugee resettlement in this country, certainly not the only way, but an important one.

In the first year of the Trump presidency only 29,725 refugees were admitted to the US, that is a big drop from the 99,183 allowed in the previous calendar year. (In 1980, by comparison, the United States welcomed more than 200,000 refugees.

Now in your estimation where do you think things stand among evangelicals and what must our response be?

Ed Stetzer’s answer:

Question 2: Dr. Stetzer, you’ve signed on early to the Evangelical Immigration Table’s statement of principles for immigration reform. Many of us are pleased to see the White House offer a framework for Dreamers last week. We’re especially glad it outlines a path to citizenship. This is a good starting point for Congress to get to work. Our immigration system has been broken for too long, and it’s well past time to pass a permanent solution.

When it comes to immigration dialogue in our county & support of Dreamers from our church, why is it so important to not find our identity in our position politically but how would you as an evangelical pastor lead your flock?

Ed Stetzer’s answer:

We will unpack these answers more in the coming days, but let this be an encouragement of how evangelicals must respond. Continue to pray for Ed Stetzer as he is a leading voice on these issues to evangelicals.

For more information, please read from Leading evangelicals responding to the White House yesterday here.

Memphis immigration Project exists to engage issues of Immigration from a biblical perspective.