How Churches Can Welcome Immigrant Believers
Immigrant believers often arrive with deep, tested faith, and too often they quietly drift from churches that never quite made room. If you’re a pastor or ministry leader, here are practical ways to welcome them well.
The heart of it
God repeatedly told Israel to love the stranger, “for ye were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deuteronomy 10:19). The early church at Pentecost heard the gospel “every man in his own language” (Acts 2:6). Welcoming believers from other nations isn’t charity. It’s a picture of heaven, where people from “all nations, and kindreds, and people, and tongues” worship together (Revelation 7:9).
Practical steps
- Learn names, and say them correctly. It matters more than you think.
- Ask about their faith story, not just their immigration story. Many have served in ministry back home.
- Invite them to serve and lead, not only to receive.
- Make language easier: a translated bulletin, a bilingual song, a prayer in another language, or interpretation headsets if your church can.
- Partner with an ethnic congregation in your city, or host one.
- Help with practical needs like rides, job connections and navigating systems, while honoring dignity.
- Remember holidays and hard news. When disaster strikes someone’s home country, pray for it publicly and check on your members.
Avoid these
- Treating newcomers only as a mission project
- Assuming people are new to faith
- Asking about legal status in casual conversation
Resources
Share Far From Home, a free tool in five languages, with newcomers in your church, and use Every Nation, One Prayer to pray for members’ home countries together.
