AAPI Month: Where are you from?

The religious elite in Jerusalem thought that god only worked in the important places like the temple. They thought that if you were on the periphery, if you were an immigrant in a foreign land, you were outside of god's focus. But Stephen Stephen shows us that god was watching Moses every single day in Midian. God wasn't waiting for Moses to get back to some kind of holy place to start his training. The desert was his training. In the palace, Moses learned how to be the prince. In the wilderness, Moses learned how to be a shepherd. He had to lose his Egyptian title to find his divine calling. [00:50:54] (43 seconds)  #DesertAsTraining

Bunnenbush proves that god is not actually a local god. He's a god of the diaspora. He's a god who is accessible to everyone. You don't need a passport. You don't need some kind of of of dub to say that you can enter. There is no qualifier that you need. This god is fully accessible to all whether you are considered here or not from here. He is the god who travels with the refugee. He sits with the immigrant in the waiting room who even finds himself in the ICE detention center who turns the foreigner's land into a sanctuary. [00:56:21] (45 seconds)  #GodOfTheDiaspora

So to those who have ever heard or will ever hear the question posed to them, where are you from or where are you from from? Today, I want to encourage you. You can stand with the confidence in spite of feeling othered. You can stand with the confidence of Stephen and the fire of Moses. You are from a lineage of migrants, sojourners, and displaced children of god. You are from a long line of people who discovered that god doesn't live in a single building or a specific zip code. The land upon you stand is holy ground. [00:57:06] (43 seconds)  #BelongBeyondBorders

This Asian American and Pacific Islander heritage month, we celebrate the hyphenated identities in you and those around us. Our being from here and there, our being from both or neither is not a mistake. It's actually a divine calling. Our displacement is the very soil where god lights the fire. You don't have to wait for the status to come through. You don't have to wait for someone to declare that you belong. You don't have to wait around for someone to mention that you're meant to be here. The next time you feel out of place or see someone feel out of place, look down at your feet, you're on holy ground. If God is with you, you aren't standing in foreign land, you're standing on holy ground. [00:59:38] (61 seconds)  #HyphenatedAndHoly

God didn't tell Moses, hurry up and get back to the palace or or or or go go amongst your people so that you can be amongst religious folk. He says, take your shoes off right here. Remove your sandals here because this is holy ground. You don't need to travel to try and find it. This is holy ground. In many of our homes today, some of us, we we take up our shoes or we even ask people to remove their shoes before they enter our home because it's our sacred space. It's our holy space. It's a sign to say that your home here. Verse 33 in this story, the only person on earth standing on holy ground was the man who didn't even have a country to call his own. [00:55:30] (52 seconds)  #HolyGroundAtHome

They ask the stinging question, who made you ruler over us, judge over us? In an instant, Moses' sense of belonging is completely and utterly shattered. He's not Egyptian enough, Egyptian enough for the palace. They will kill him for his betrayal, and he isn't Hebrew enough for the people. They don't trust him because he hasn't shared their struggle. This is the first where are you from from moment. The Hebrews are essentially saying, you aren't from here. You don't sound like us. So who are you to tell any of us who we are? [00:44:50] (38 seconds)  #RejectedByBothSides

He's a stranger and as a foreigner, and he may even have some kind of holy idea from God that he's supposed to step out and and be very present for his people, but he is super insecure about even associating with them. Verse 25 tells us that he thought his own people would realize that god was using that him to rescue. Moses assumes his actions will prove his origins, and he thinks that that'd be by defending his community, he will earn his membership card. [00:43:38] (38 seconds)  #BelongingIsNotEarned

But look at the crushing reality of verse 27. The man who was wrong in his neighbor pushed Moses aside saying, who made you ruler and judge over us? This is after Moses killed the Egyptian. And the Israelites comes and speaks to him and says this. Moses tries to help. The next day, he his fellow Hebrew Hebrews turn on him. They don't see a brother. They see an impostor. This is a where are you from from moment. [00:44:17] (33 seconds)  #SeenAsImpostor