Excerpt for IWU student study in Spiritual Formation/LCE class

—from the book Unveiled Faces by Keith Drury

© 2005 The Wesleyan Church

8

Hospitality

 

Hospitality

Hospitality is opening our homes, our hearts, and our lives to others in order to develop loving relationships to the glory of God.  The English word might sound too much like “hospital” or “hospice” for us to greet the discipline with delight.  However the Greek word brings out its biblical meaning better—it means “lovers of strangers.”  Hospitality is inviting people we don’t know into our personal space and making them feel at home.  It is a friend-making skill.  Practicing this discipline brings us wonderful new friends and in the process we become more interesting persons.  In Hospitality we give and get friendship.  When we learn it well it becomes an antidote to loneliness—our own and that of others. 

 

Friend-making

Hospitality helps us develop friend-making skills.  If we’ve moved in the last five years maybe we’ve found it difficult to “break into” our new church’s cliques. We may feel lonely.  Or worse, maybe the church has no cliques!  Some churches have no groupings of friends—people just attend like they would a movie: they watch the show and go home.  Churches can even be lonely places sometimes. Hospitality practiced in a church helps people make friends. A single person often does the inviting, but practiced well it will spread and have massive social consequences.  Though the Bible commends hospitality and even commands it, we get something out of it too.  We get friends.  Hospitality teaches us how to make friends—a skill we will need more as we get older.  People who have “automatic friends” because they still live near childhood friends and family sometimes never learn skills of friend-making. As their friends die off one by one they are increasingly left alone and friendless in the world simply.  They had friends but never made them.  Learning the discipline of friend-making enables us to move a thousand miles away or enter a nursing home far from family and not be lonely.  We can always have friends because we know how to make them.  We should practice hospitality because it is right and good even if we got nothing out of it, but it has significant personal benefits: friends

 

The spiritual discipline of hospitality

But this chapter is not about making friends or even the discipline of practicing hospitality—it is about the spiritual discipline of hospitality. What makes hospitality spiritual?   For starters hospitality is commanded in the Bible.  Indeed all of the great religions of the world insist on this virtue (that some other religions practice it better than Christians should discomfort us).  But anyone can show hospitality.  What makes it a spiritual discipline—a Christian discipline—is when we practice hospitality for Christ and the kingdom of God, not just to have a good time with our friends after church. Just as dieting is not fasting so entertaining is not automatically hospitality.  Our motive is the test, and the effect.  Why do we invite other over, and whom are we inviting.  Our motive will show us if we are practicing true Christian hospitality.  The spiritual discipline of hospitality is not about having fun with my friends but inviting strangers too.  Hospitality adds an invitation to people not in my party-clique.  Hospitality reaches out to bring strangers into the inner circle.  Hospitality is thus a self-less act.  It is for the other person, the stranger, the lonely person, the new person, and the person who “doesn’t fit in.”  This is why it is a spiritual discipline and why it is rare—it is so unselfish.  It becomes a “means of grace” as God works through the relationships hospitality enables. God favors working through groups.  This is why He left us the church instead of a command to engage in the solitary life.  While many of the disciplines in this book are solitary, they are not a way of life but are momentary.  They should lead us back into the church where most of God’s sanctifying work is done.  When we practice hospitality we connect with others through whom God speaks to us and to whom God speaks through us.  It is a discipline because it is not natural.  Naturally we invite our friends to our homes; supernaturally we also invite strangers.

 

Hospitality in the Bible

The Bible gives frequent examples of hospitality.  Abraham opened his tent to strangers.  Jesus was born after his parents were offered hospitality.   Mary and Martha offered their home to Jesus on his visits to Jerusalem.  In fact hospitality was universally considered a virtue in the ancient world where desert travel could mean death if local people did not open their homes to travelers. But this practice is not merely an ancient custom designed for ages without rest stops or motels. It is a virtue we ought to practice today.  Paul simply told the Romans to “practice hospitality” (Romans 12:13). The writer of Hebrews reminded us that by showing hospitality to strangers “some who did this have entertained angels without realizing it.”(Hebrews 13:2)  Peter said we were to “offer hospitality to one another without grumbling.”(1 Peter 4:8-10)   John instructed us on the how to treat traveling speakers—“show hospitality to such men” (3 John 7-8).  Hospitality was compulsory for the widows called to church work (1 Timothy 5:9-10) and church leaders too including bishops and overseers (1 Timothy 3:2; Titus 1:7-8).  Perhaps the most startling teaching on hospitality comes from the mouth of Jesus.  He taught that at the judgment some of us would be condemned for our lack of hospitality to Him—only to discover that in failing to see “a stranger and take him in” we were rejecting Jesus Himself (Matthew 25:34-40).  This is not to suggest a “hospitality or hell” doctrine, but certainly we cannot ignore Jesus at this point.  Hospitality is not merely a nice thing to do.  It may be introduced as evidence when we meet Christ.

 

Why do we resist?

So, why are we so slow to invite people outside of our social group into our homes?   How come so many of us go for weeks without opening up our homes to anyone else at all, let alone inviting strangers over?  To start with, we are busy.  Many of us live at such a frantic pace we just don’t have the time to practice hospitality. We might arrange for a quick meal at a restaurant or a night at the movies, but we simply don’t have time to invite people to our homes.  There are other reasons though. If we invite all our friends or our small group over and add a few “strangers” our friends may wonder, “What are they doing here?”  Most of us like stable cliques or small groups and if we let our natural selves rule we will fellowship only with those we already know and like.  “Inviting strangers” into our cliques and groups makes our friends feel awkward.  So, we don’t even try.

 

Hospitality vs. entertainment

If we feel compelled to do something “elaborate” whenever people come to our homes we may not be practicing true hospitality at all.  Putting on a show for guests by rushing home to perfectly clean up the house and arrange an impressive meal could indicate we are more concerned about impressing people than extending them true hospitality.  Hospitality is about the guest not the host.  It does not focus on the host’s fancy skills at preparation and house-keeping but it asks, “What will make people feel a part of our family?”  Being a fancy host who “entertains” elaborately can be merely a way to gather an audience to praise the host’s skills. Hospitality is inviting.  It invites people into our family not to be an audience.  The best hospitality makes strangers feel at home.  Guests want to kick off their shoes and put on slippers.

 

Our Example

Of course God is the original Host.   God extended an invitation to us when we were far off—even His enemies, for us to come into His family.  He desires a relationship with us and calls us to Him.  God is the shepherd-host who prepares a table before us.  At His final meal on earth, the “Lord’s Supper” He promised us that we would one day join Him again at another meal—the “Marriage Supper of the Lamb.”  God has invited us into the warmth of His family.  Now He asks us now to do likewise—inviting others into our homes.  God is hospitable.  Hospitality is godly.  Practicing the discipline of hospitality makes us more like God.

 

Men and hospitality

Hospitality is sometimes wrongly considered a more feminine virtue.  But men are not exempt from the call to hospitality. The “personal space” of men might be the garage, yard or hunting lodge but men can still be inviting to strangers.  Men practice hospitality when they call their neighbor to their garage to help unload the lawn mower rather than insisting on doing it themselves. When a man invites a couple of strangers along with his friends to watch Monday night football he is practicing hospitality.  Men practice hospitality when they invite an outsider to join their traditional buddies on the annual hunting trip.  Hospitality opens our personal space and our lives to other people, especially strangers, in order to develop relationships with them.  Men should do this just as much as women.  Some just do it differently.

 

Third step hospitality

Christians go a third step in hospitality.  At least serious ones do.  First step hospitality is inviting our friends. But, what credit is it that we show hospitality to our friends? Not much—this is the sort of things even pagans do.  It is not wrong to invite friends over, but it is not the spiritual discipline of hospitality. If we need “discipline” to spend time with our friends we probably need therapy!  The spiritual discipline of hospitality goes a second step: inviting strangers, outsiders, foreigners, and outcasts into our lives.  This is why it is a discipline—it isn’t normal behavior for self-centered people and self-protecting cliques to reach out to strangers.  This is “second-step hospitality”—inviting strangers along with our friends.   However serious Christians go a third step:—inviting their enemies to dinner.  Third step hospitality brings an enemy into our personal space in order to build or heal relationships.  It is hard to eat with an enemy.  Enemies either destroy the meal, or the meal destroys the enemy.  Christians destroy their enemies by making them friends.  Eating together melts icy relationships, heals hurting wounds, and cures smoldering anger.  Either this happens or the person walks away.  Eating together is sacred, perhaps even a “means of grace” when taken as such.  Maybe this is why Jesus established the Eucharist as the core of worship. Eating brings people together.  So, are we ready for third-step hospitality: inviting an enemy for dinner?  Could we invite someone estranged from our church to the next party?  Of course, they could say no.  But it is not about what they do, but what we try to do.  Most of Christ’s church needs to move toward second-step hospitality—inviting strangers with our friends.  But a few of us should feel compelled to go so far as to practice third-step hospitality—showing hospitality to our enemies.

 

Communal hospitality

This book is about personal disciplines but we certainly ought to at least mention that there is such a thing as “communal hospitality.”  A group can be hospitable or inhospitable just like an individual.  Hospitality for a church is making room for outsiders and turning them into insiders.  Some churches are simply inhospitable places.  They claim, “We’re a loving church here—just like a family.”  What they don’t add is, “In fact, this church is a family and nobody else can break into our tight-knit family.”  A church can be a loving place for the people already in the club, yet be inhospitable to outsiders.  When a church practices hospitality they warmly welcome newcomers.  We scoot down the pew to make room for visitors and don’t make them clamber over our knees to find a seat.  We encourage new folk to lead a discussion in Sunday school or serve as an usher.  Hospitable churches make newcomers feel at home.  And the newcomers stay because in a few weeks they consider the church their “home church.” All churches get rid of strangers.  Inhospitable churches get rid of strangers by cold-shouldering them away. Hospitable churches get rid of them by making them friends. When we practice hospitality we are being like God—he invited us into His family when we were His enemies.  Of all places the church should be the most hospitable.

 

How to start practicing this discipline.

  1. Offer a guest room to the church. Call the church office and offer your guest room to future speakers or college groups who might need a place to stay when coming to your church.  The rise of motel lodging for guest speakers is a great time-saver for the church, but often banishes the speaker to a lonely life in a sterile atmosphere.  Inviting a guest home will enrich you life—and if you have children immensely affect their future.  Of course don’t “entertain” them to dearth or dump your problems on them. In fact, don’t even spend too much time “picking their brains.”  Just let them rest just like they would at their own home—this is hospitality.
  2. Feed the neighborhood birds.  OK it sounds silly but perhaps hospitality starts by feeding birds or even those bothersome squirrels in your neighborhood?  If you’re the kind of person who’d rather shoot animals than welcome them, perhaps this sort of attitude bleeds over into your relationships with people too?   If so, learn to be more welcoming to the animal “trespassers” at your home and you may become more welcoming to the human interlopers.  If you start with those squirrels you can later move up to people!
  3. Invite neighbors over some night this week. How long have you lived where you now live?  Have you had your neighbors into your home yet?  For a meal?  Try one neighbor this week—not even for the whole evening and fancy fiixins’—perhaps just send out for pizza and get to know them.  At least get them inside your “personal space.”
  4. Offer your house to the youth group. Youth groups are always looking for new places to go.  Offer your house, or yard, or barn to the youth leaders in your church and decide ahead of time you won’t do a walk-around damage assessment when they leave. 
  5. Invite a single or married person.  If you are married invite a single person to your home.  If single invite a married couple. Find someone unlike you whom you barely know and invite them to your home. Who knows maybe you’ll make a new friend.
  6. Add someone to your holiday dinner.  Can you think of anyone who might be alone this Thanksgiving or Christmas?  Why not invite them to join you this coming holiday?  You wouldn’t lose much and they’d gain a whopping lot. If you were to do this who would you invite?
  7. Bring a beggar home for dinner.  If you never see a beggar forget this one, but if you happen to see a hungry person this week why not risk enough to bring them home for a dinner before returning them to their corner.  Who knows, some have entertained angels doing this.
  8. What other idea can you think of?

 

Now, what about you?  What are your specific plans to practice this discipline this week?

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helps for teaching and leading your class or small group through this chapter are located at the back of this book.