When I was growing up I church was our life. In addition to church services and ministries, people shared life with one another. I remember people in our home after Sunday evening services, sitting around the table. The menu was simple fare, usually just sandwiches, chips and iced tea. It wasn’t the food that was important, it was the fellowship. The act of opening your home, inviting others into your life, sharing together, and praying together, this is what was valued.
There is a Christ-like characteristic that I don’t hear talked about much any more. It is the character trait of hospitality.
It feels as if we might think of hospitality as an optional aspect of Christianity, but the Bible has a lot to say about it. Consider these verses:
1 Peter 4:9 - “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.”
Romans 12:13 - “Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.”
Titus 1:8 - “Be hospitable, a lover of good, self-controlled, upright, holy, and disciplined.”
Hospitality is also included in the New Testament as a requirement for who serve in the ministry.
What is biblical hospitality? It is practical demonstrations of love for one another. It is practiced as we share our lives with one another. Hospitality going out of our way to meet a practical need. It can be providing a meal or opening our home. It can be babysitting for a single mother. It could be sharing resources with someone who is in need. The opportunities are endless.
As I pray about this biblical call to show hospitality, I realize that I am willing, I’m just not always aware. I’m willing to help others, but I recognize that I’m not always intentional in practicing hospitality. I’m not always looking for opportunities. It’s here that I need God’s help.
If you read the gospels, you see Jesus practicing hospitality. Jesus ate with sinners throughout His earthly ministry. He received children gladly. He taught us to invite the lowly to parties and to welcome strangers. He prepared breakfast for His wayward disciples, including Peter who had betrayed Him.
According to Jesus, discipleship demands dependence on hospitality. In Mark 6, Jesus sends out his disciples two by two to preach that people should repent. Jesus told them not to take any food, money, or even extra clothes. The expectation was that they would receive hospitality from those they ministered to.
What Jesus knew was that ministry is done in the context of personal relationships. As the disciples met with people, as they ate together in their homes, as they spent time together, the opportunity would present itself to share the message.
Today, we live in such an individualistic culture that it seems we rarely share our lives with one another. Hospitality is a thing of the past. Whether it’s busyness, selfishness, mistrust, or lack of interest, we are missing this critical part of the body of Christ.
I think it is natural to neglect hospitality. It is the path of least resistance. All we have to do is yield to the natural gravity of our self-centered life, and the result will be a life so full of self that there is no room for hospitality. We will forget about it. And we will neglect it.
God knew this would be our struggle. This is why we hear the biblical call to show hospitality to one another.
You see, most of us know what true hospitality feels like. It means being received openly, warmly, freely, without any need to prove ourselves. Hospitality makes us feel worthy, because our host assumes we are worthy. This is the kind of hospitality that we have experienced from God, and all that God asks is that we go and do likewise.”
Today’s Challenge: Let God’s Word sink into your heart today: “Show hospitality to others.” Ask God to give you this desire to practice this Christ-like trait. Look for opportunities to bless others through hospitality.
