3MN: Using your Christian home in a daily way to make strangers neighbors, and neighbors family.
Happy Thursday!
In the next 3 minutes:
- Why we need to put new feet under our tables.
- A radical perspective on hospitality.
- Whoa re you inviting over first?
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Minute 1 - Putting new feet under our tables.
Tonight we are opening our home to a small group of young adults and new professionals. This evening is a part of our current series on hospitality.
Hospitality is one of the most powerful instruments for sharing the gospel with others, so we need to be putting new feet under our tables.
I like to imagine a world where every Christian is known as the most hospitable family in their neighborhood. A world where every Christian opened their doors generously and frequently for meals with their neighbors, friends, co-workers, and extended family.
It would require rearranging our schedule. It might mean reallocating our finances to have a budget for it. It would definitely require readjusting our expectations of what our dream house would look like.
But there may be no greater opportunity to show and share the love of Christ than by opening your doors to your neighbors and inviting them into your home for a meal.
Minute 2 - Radically ordinary hospitality.
I have been thinking a lot about hospitality lately, primarily because I am reading a new book by Rosaria Butterfield titled The Gospel Comes With A House Key.
Here are a few of my highlighted quotes.
“Radically ordinary hospitality is this: using your Christian home in a daily way that seeks to make strangers neighbors, and neighbors family of God.”
“We introverts miss out on great blessings when we excuse ourselves from practicing hospitality because it exhausts us. I often find people exhausting. But over the years I have learned how to pace myself, how to prepare for the private time necessary to recharge, and how to grow in discomfort. Knowing your personality and your sensitivities does not excuse you from ministry. It means that you need to prepare for it differently than others might.”
“Hospitality shares what there is; that’s all. It’s not entertainment. It’s not supposed to be.”
Minute 3 - Have you opened your doors and invited strangers inside?
There is no greater invitation than to be invited to sit at Christ's table. And God has placed you in your neighborhood to extend an invitation to those who do not yet know Him.
Hospitality turns strangers, into neighbors, into friends, into family.
Who are you going to invite over to your home first?
ODD VERSE OF THE WEEK
Then he brought the tribe of Benjamin forward by its families, and the Matrite family was selected by lot. And Saul the son of Kish was selected by lot; but when they looked for him, he could not be found. - 1 Samuel 10:21
On my TikTok series Roll For Verse, I use dice to choose a random Bible verse each day and offer a devotional thought. Watch the full episode or read more about this verse.
See you next Thursday,
Payton Minzenmayer
P.S. - A 4,300-year-old Egyptian tomb found with wall paintings.