In recent history, American churches have neglected
becoming the welcoming communities described in the bible. We failed to live up to the extravagant love
expressed in Jesus’ parables, The
Good Samaritan and The
Prodigal Son. I wonder how often
we pray for those who cannot care for themselves. In Jesus’ day, strangers (transients and
immigrants), orphans, and widows could not sustain themselves. In our day, single mothers, the homeless,
those struggling with mental illness, and so many more cannot provide for
themselves. How often do we pray for
them, much less watch out for them or care for them?
Lately, I have pondered the practice of hospitality and how
desperately our world needs us to practice it.
The biblical word translated hospitality literally means welcome for the
stranger. While hospitality may begin
(and for those who attend our church gatherings should begin) with a greeting
at the door on Sunday morning, it is so much more than that. The biblical practice of hospitality goes far
deeper than any program. Hospitality is an
expression of the heart.
Hospitality begins as attitude and passion. As an attitude, hospitality asks, “Who can I
pray for today, meet today, bless today, or care for today?”
The father in Jesus’ prodigal son parable offers a great
image of this. He waits for his lost,
reckless son to come home. Jesus does
not describe passive waiting, but active.
The father looks for his son. We
get the impression that day in and day out he stands and waits or sits and
waits, watching for his son’s silhouette at the bottom of the hill, the
beginning of the pathway home. How many
days did he pace back and forth on his front porch hoping he would see his
son? At the end of how many days did his
heart break because there was no prodigal to welcome home?
His son had become a stranger, an outsider. He had offended his father, his family, his
community, and his people. Leaving home,
he had committed atrocities no self-respecting Jewish son would ever commit. He was far away. That doesn’t mean he was in a distant
land. It means he had walked away from
God and family.
Any normal Jewish father would have disowned his son, but
not this father. He waited, he watched, he
longed, he hoped for his son’s return.
When finally his son’s shadow could be seen cast against the rocks of
the hilly path, the father cast off his shoes, jumped off his porch, and ran to
greet his son. He kissed him, hugged
him, welcomed him, and restored him. On
returning, the prodigal experienced hospitality. His father welcomed him, the stranger,
home.
We Christians are
defined by what we oppose rather than promote.
A recent book, unChristian,
written by David Kinnaman and Gabe Lyons, reports that non-Christians ages 16-29
believe Christians in America
are, among other things, judgmental, anti-homosexual, too political, and
hypocritical.
Unfortunately, they have had good reasons to think that
way. Christian leaders claiming to
represent us seemed to lose the capacity to disagree without being
disagreeable, to love and accept people regardless of what they do without
condoning what they do. They specialized
in rejecting instead of welcoming.
In unhealthy ways, politics blended with faith until the two
seemed one. I half expected the
evangelistic question, “If you died tonight, do you know where you would spend
eternity?” to be replaced with “Who did you vote for in the last presidential
election?”
Christian leaders seemed to be developing a Nixonian list of
enemies—people to be defeated and marginalized instead of embraced and
convinced of God’s love and compassion for them. They even turned on other Christians.
I was shocked when a group of national leaders demanded the dismissal
of an executive of the National Association of
Evangelicals because of his desire to address global warming. I understand the political, economical, and
potential environmental consequences of global warming science. I respect those, Christian or not, on both
sides of the issue. I fail, however, to
see how global warming affects our expression of faith. We are called to care for creation
whether or not the earth is warming.
These and other positions only encourage others to define
Christians by what we oppose rather than what we promote. We are characterized by anger and dissent
rather than our love and acceptance. We
who have received immeasurable grace and forgiveness are seen as those who dole
out judgment and hatred.
Personally, I think we’re coming around. Even those who claim to lead us seem to be
coming around. But, we have a long way
to go before our image changes.
Adopting an
attitude of hospitality:
Several weeks ago, a guy in our church approached me. He’s been attending our worship gatherings for
a while. He even helps out some
weeks. During our brief conversation, he
told me he isn’t a Christian. He said he
used to be anti-Christian but is changing.
He wants to get closer to God and experience Jesus. We talked about how he could do that. I was inspired by the way he has been
welcomed into our midst even before believing.
We are showing him hospitality.
A few of my questions: How can we continue to develop the
attitude we see in Jesus’ father? How
can we improve in offering the welcome of the father, the offer of
hospitality? How can we intensify our
watching, waiting, longing, and hoping for those immersed in sinful practice to
come home? How can we run to them,
embrace them, and restore them? What
more can we do?
These are thoughts I have been pondering for some time. I’ll share more next week when I look at hospitality
as passion.
------------------------------------ *Subtitle of Rich Nathan's book, Who Is My Enemy
| 
