I used to consider myself hospitable. In fact, I prided myself on it. I would invite someone over, plan it on the calendar and then the day of, I would pick up the thousands of toys my four kids had scattered about, clean pee off of the toilet seat, and make sure to plan an allergy friendly snack for when our guest arrived. I had conversation topics planned for if the conversation lagged and made sure my kids were prepped with activities and reminded them again to share their toys and not to argue.
Then I moved to a new city. My kids were a little thrown with the change and my new neighbors felt so close that I could almost reach my arm out of a window and touch their houses. The walls seemed really thin and the crowded sidewalks felt really close to my house. My mother-in-law moved in with us and I was stumped as to why my self-proclaimed poster girl for hospitality was struggling with being surrounded by a full home. We prayed for this. We moved for this. So why all of a sudden did it feel like the walls were closing in? Strangers were witnessing my parenting while I was struggling to help one kid mid meltdown, while also trying to make sure the other kids were not running into the nearby busy road; all while also trying to carry on a conversation with new people. In my arrogance I was believing lies that my hospitality was going to offer people something special.
What I not so quickly, and with a very stubborn heart, realized was that I liked to be hospitable on MY terms. Not God’s terms. I wanted people to see me prepared and full of Jesus, but I didn’t want them to see the process of me actually needing Jesus. I didn’t want people to see me stumbling and asking for help or apologizing to my kids for the hundredth time that day.
In the book, The Gospel Comes with a House Key, Rosaria Butterfield says, “When our Christian homes are open, our unsaved neighbors watch us struggle with our own sins- both of our doing and the sin nature with which we wage daily combat” (p 32).
I am learning that hospitality is less about having a prepared home and more about pulling back the curtain and allowing people the gift of being welcomed just as we all are. Yes, it can include curated dinners. But, hospitality is also clearing your schedule when a neighbor needs help. It’s answering the door when people knock unannounced. It’s prayer walking my neighborhood in the early mornings, it’s walking a friend home from school, it’s a meal train, it’s hosting a prayer night, it’s feeding a stranger, and talking to the person on the sidewalk.
If you have read the book I mentioned above, The Gospel Comes with a House Key, you may have been left feeling a myriad of emotions. Both, “wow, yes, this is the kind of hospitality that I want to aim for” and also, “wow, this kind of living is just not practical.” In the past 6 months, I have been convicted that the hospitality that Jesus gave for me was not practical either. He didn’t love us sinners simply when it was convenient or when He was prepared. Rather, He gave literally everything for us. If we want to love our neighbors in the same way, we must love with relentless abandonment. As Rosaria said, “Good neighboring is at the heart of the gospel we know.” Would you join me in praying that God will take our understanding of hospitality deeper than we could have ever imagined? May we be obedient to what God calls us to and lift up our heads to see those He has placed in our paths.