Hospitality

As we continue to unpack what it means to love God and others, I am struck by the power of Hospitality. In one sense a gesture of love to others and in another sense a great picture of response by us to Him by being obedient to who He told us to be known as, men and women of love, and all that only possible because He loved us first!

We have had a team of people come together recently to think about the gift of Hospitality led by our own Cyndi Lott and WOW they are right on track. Their first meeting was not too long ago and in that meeting they remembered that this is not about bagels, decorations or crafts, although they can be a part it, this is about something much bigger than that. Their mission statement as a ministry makes it all very clear, “Lovingly serve our neighbors, our community and church family by connecting them to Christ and to one another through acts of hospitality“. That night Cyndi read from an article published online through Revive Our Hearts Ministry, taken from and interview with Leslie Basham and Nancy Leigh De Moss that aired on Tuesday, Dec 3, 2002 called: The Heart of Hospitality: Jesus the Ultimate Host. This week and next weeks articles will be from that interview because sometimes it is just said really well by someone else…enjoy! If you would like to be a part of the Northland Oviedo Hospitality team seeking to impact all of our Oviedo community for Christ, please contact Cyndi Lott (Cyndi.lott@northlandchurch.net).

Leslie Basham, “As you read the Book of Romans, you realize that the first several chapters are Paul talking about some pretty heavy doctrinal matters. He’s talking about the Gospel of Christ. Then as he comes to the second half of the Book of Romans he starts saying, “How does this affect the way that we live?” When we come to chapter 12 of Romans, Paul gives many practical exhortations about what it means to live out the Gospel of Christ. In verse 10 of Romans 12, Paul says “Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love, having received what you have in Christ, now love one another.” Then he goes on to say “pursuing hospitality.”

We are talking about the ministry of hospitality and how, as we open our homes and hearts to other people, we manifest, we express the Gospel of Christ to them. We want to talk today about what Christian hospitality is.

What does it mean to be hospitable? The word hospitality in the New Testament comes from two Greek words. The first word means love and the second word means strangers. It’s a word that means love of strangers.

The dictionary talks about hospitality as giving a friendly welcome and kind or generous treatment offered to guests or strangers. Another dictionary defines hospitality this way, “The act of receiving and entertaining strangers or guests without reward and with kind and generous liberality, to be friendly, welcoming, kind and generous to guests or strangers.”

Now when I think of the word hospitality there are some other similar words that come to mind, words like hospital. And I wonder, Did these words have anything in common?”

“As I went back and studied them, I discovered that they did. For example, the word hospital in its original meaning was a place of shelter and rest for travelers, a charitable institution for providing and caring for the aged, the infirmed and the orphaned; a place where people are cared for.

I’ve experienced that kind of ministry as a guest in people’s homes numbers of times over the years as they have brought me into their home at times when my spirit just desperately needed to be refreshed or strengthened or encouraged. I’ve found in other people’s homes a hospital, a place where their hospitality was ministering to my wounded spirit.

I think of the word hospice. That’s another similar word. In the dictionary it says that a hospice is a place of shelter for travelers, a home for the sick or poor; a home-like facility to provide supportive care for terminally ill patients.

It’s a place where care is provided for people who are desperately needy and, as we have come to use the term today, a hospice is care for those who are terminally ill. Hospital, hospitality, hospice is a way of caring for those who are needy.

But there’s another word that is at the root of all of those words. It’s the word host–someone who receives or entertains guests, someone who entertains another at his own house without reward.

Now there’s an interesting concept when we think of the word host that shows us how hospitality, being a gracious host or hostess, ties us into the Gospel of Christ. Because, you see, the word host can also mean a victim or a sacrifice. It’s applied to our Savior who offered Himself for the sins of men.

He is our host. In fact in our liturgical churches when the Lord’s supper is served, the wafer, the piece of bread, is called the host. It speaks of representing the body of Christ that is offered and consecrated and eaten. We partake of His body symbolically during the Christian ceremony of communion. That says to me that Christian hospitality, being a godly host or hostess, takes us back to the cross. The cross is where Christ spread out and opened His arms, wide–He opened His arms wide to the world and He said, “I welcome you. I receive you.”

The cross is where Christ said, “I will die in your place so that I can be your host. Welcome to my Father’s house, welcome home. You are invited to my Father’s house. I want you to come home with me. I want you to live there with me.”

On the cross He became our host. Now He says to us “Open your arms, open your heart, lay down your life, give up your life, be willing to open your heart and your home to receive others as I have received you.” He did it without hope of reward and He said to us, “You do it whether you ever get rewarded for it or not.”

As He invites us to come and partake of Him, even as we partake of communion, we are reminded of the hospitality of God, the host that Christ is to us. Then we realize that we can be His representatives here on earth, opening our hearts, our arms and our homes to others and welcoming them to come with us into the home and heart of God.”

That whole interview is awesome to me and seen clearly in the ministry mission statement for this Northland @ Oviedo Hospitality team, “Lovingly serve our neighbors, our community and church family by connecting them to Christ and to one another through acts of hospitality”