When you reap the harvest of your land, moreover, you shall not reap to the very corners of your field nor gather the gleaning of your harvest; you are to leave them for the needy and the alien. I am the LORD your God.
Leviticus 23:22 Cursed is he who distorts the justice due an alien, orphan, and widow.’ And all the people shall say, ‘Amen.’
Deuteronomy 27:19
Once again it is late fall and I am saying goodbye to young people who have traveled thousands of miles to work on the housekeeping staffs of our area resorts and the wait staffs and kitchens of our restaurants. The international students who come to Cook County from all over the world are remarkable young people. The courage they exhibit coming half way around the world to a tiny town between the forest and a sweet water ocean to do jobs that are, well, uninspiring is a constant source of wonder to me.
These young people are with few exceptions college and graduate school educated. Many people would be discouraged to work years for an engineering degree or a master’s in finance and then invest thousands of dollars into flying to a strange place for the purpose of cleaning bathrooms or baking pizzas. But I rarely hear complaints from these students.
One reason many young people come here is to improve their English. These well-read and intelligent young people come here knowing that to gain the language experience they desire, they will have to swallow their pride and do the best they can to communicate with us. They know full well that they will mispronounce and misuse words. They know that some will hear their mistakes and think of them as dimwitted or unintelligent. They know it would be the same in their country if the tables were turned. But they accept this as the cost of achieving their purpose. They have come a long way to forge a future for themselves and they are going to see it through.
Every year our church hosts monthly dinners for the summer students and the winter students. Every year I look forward to hearing their stories and discussing their plans. It is great to have them over to our house for dinners. We have often offered to buy the groceries if they wanted to cook some of their own home cooked food from far away homes! The results have been some of our best experiences on the North Shore.
I look at these young people like I look at my own kids. Courage, intelligence, affability and a determination to take considerable personal risks to make good things happen in their lives are characteristic of my experience with them.
Very few of these students have serious complaints or regrets about their experience in Cook County. A surprising number of them come back again. One student has been here five summers! I am glad of this fact and proud of our community.
God has made it very clear that we are to show hospitality and justice to those who sojourn amongst us… those who are aliens to our culture. The verses above are just two examples of God’s instruction to look out for our neighbor, even if the neighborhood is the whole world.
If they are serving your table or carrying your groceries out to your car, take the opportunity to chat and befriend them. If they take the risk of conversing with you in our language, invest a minute in listening and responding. These young people have a spark that sets them off from their peers who stayed at home. You will count it an honor to know them, as I do, if you take a small portion of personal risk to say hello! Each month a member of the Cook County Ministerium will offer Spiritual Reflections. This week our contributor is Pastor Dave Harvey, who has served as pastor of Grand Marais Evangelical Free Church since February of 2008.
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