The Call to Hospitality- Passing on Blessings (Part 4 of 5)

My husband and I and our friend Susan recently had an opportunity to visit the home of an Iraqi refugee. We were invited into the small apartment and offered sweet, delicious Turkish coffee. It was hot that day; there was no air conditioning in the home. The family did not own much; their furniture were most likely second-hand. But we chatted for hours and left feeling like old friends.

Sometimes I forget that hospitality doesn't depend on the size of my home, or the price of my furniture, or the food I offer my guests. I live in an area where many of the homes, inside and out, look like they could be featured on a magazine cover. I feel the pressure to impress. But as I mentioned in previous posts, biblical hospitality is not entertaining or showing off. Biblical hospitality is taking what God has given me and multiplying it by sharing it with others.

So what does that look like? My family has sit-down dinners, so we invite people join us. I sing and play the piano, so on occasion I will visit the elderly in nursing homes and play for them. When I bake, I will make an extra loaf for a neighbor. I have a car, so I can offer someone a ride. I'm not a gardener, but if you are, you can drop off a bouquet or veggies at someone’s home. If you have time while riding the airplane, chat with the person next to you instead of scrolling on your phone. If you are sitting with friends at church, invite a new person to sit with you. There are an incredible number of ways to be hospitable when we focus on what we have, more than what we don't have! And you can be hospitable in ways that I cannot!

In the first century church, Christians opened up their homes to host church meetings. They shared everything. Acts 4 says there was not a needy person among them. People noticed that Jews and Gentiles, masters and slaves, men and women, rich and poor were welcomed. They would gather for dinners that Bible scholars call "love feasts", where communion would be shared and Christ's sacrifice be remembered.

And that is what I picture heaven to be, a giant potluck where people of all different ages and backgrounds gather together to feast. We all bring something to contribute to the meal and we all partake of what others had brought. Everyone feels welcomed and loved. It's the most amazing party of ever!

That is hospitality. A bit of heaven to earth.

The Call to Hospitality- Strangers as Family (Part 3 of 5)

We are surrounded by lonely people. 

An article on the Scientific American website says, “Thanks to remarkable new technologies and the widespread use of social media, we are more 'connected' than ever before. Yet as a nation, we are also more lonely. In fact, a recent study found that a staggering 47% of Americans often feel alone, left out and lacking meaningful connection with others. This is true for all ages, from teenagers to older adults.”

It’s true that once a person graduates from college, it’s harder to make friends. You might make friends at work, but rarely are those deep abiding friendships. More and more, people commute long distances to work, families don’t live near each other, and neighbors are aloof. So a person hopes to find friends somewhere, at a book club, for example. You look for friends among those who share your interests. 

But this is not the case for those of us in Christ's family.  We come from many different backgrounds and have many different interests, but we are united by the amazing love of Christ. We ourselves, having been invited by God to become a child in His family, now in the name of Christ look to invite “strangers” who may be very different from us. This is hospitality, treating a stranger as family, bringing in outsiders, loving others even though we may not have much in common.

Remember Hebrews 13:2, Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. 

The word 'hospitality' in the Greek is philoxenia, which literally means 'love of strangers'. This love is a brotherly affection, phileo; it’s the love described in Romans 12. If our phileo is genuine, we would not hesitate to show hospitality even to a stranger. This may mean talking to a new person on a Sunday morning. This may mean making room for one more at Christmas because someone brought with him a person who had nowhere to celebrate. The Old Testament is full of commands to include strangers, or sojourners, at the Jewish festivals and to treat them the same as if they were a Jew.

Leviticus 19:33-34 “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God."

Deuteronomy 16:14 You shall rejoice in your feast, you and your son and your daughter, your male servant and your female servant, the Levite, the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow who are within your towns.

And these are just two of the many commandments given to the Israelites. The idea here is when you see at stranger, you don’t look upon him as an outsider. You treat him just as if he is one of you.

Now, of course this doesn't mean that you have to invite home every person you meet on the street. The key is to remember that as Christians, we are not a part of an exclusive club. We should never become detached, elite, or cliquey. We should strive (dioko, remember that verb from Part 2?) to be the first one to intentionally break the invisible barrier that divides us as strangers. And for some of us, this is hard. We feel vulnerable. We worry about what people might say if we shared ourselves with them. But put aside your self-consciousness and uneasiness as you look to Jesus as the ultimate example of love. He loved us even when we were His enemies. He loved those who were dirty, broken, and unworthy of love. He removed all barriers so that we could be with Him.

“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me." ~Matthew 25:37-40