Hospitality, Part 1
*Today we make the turn to consider the second of our variables and the most literature intensive: hospitality. The literature is absolutely voluminous…so, I tried to provide a good timeline here and pull a couple or precedents that in turn I am hoping to build on. I absolutely loved this part of my reading. Again, I would appreciate any interaction.
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In I Was a Stranger Arthur Sutherland writes that hospitality is “the practice by which the church stands or falls.” (Sutherland 2006) Hospitality in our day has been greatly been misconstrued to be a means to simply make other feel better about being where they are. With the wide scale advent of hotel, restaurant, conference and event industries a whole culture of business that revolves around making people comfortable has evolved. All of these fall far short though of the biblical understanding of hospitality and place that it has in the “chord of redemption” that runs throughout the scriptures and history (Oden 2001)[1]. Hospitality runs beyond the offerings of food and drink or even entertainment. For true hospitality to occur respect for the other must exist. The problem with much of the modern concept of hospitality is that it depends on the end result – often returning customers but the Biblical view is different. End results are not the goal – entering into each others presence and dwelling there with them and the God who created and loves them and us is the goal (Pohl 2005).
Sutherland would later expand on why hospitality is a must. He notes that as life goes on we become more and more aware of our loneliness and our illusions of what the world could be fade away. This is where God and the Christian community step in. God’s goal for creation is a homecoming (2006: 83). God is giving and gracious. He continually welcomes the stranger and as He does this relieving loneliness and clearing up illusions we too are invited into the process. We do this; we enter in, because it has been done for us. We also live out this role because we know that every human being is created in the imago dei, the image of God. Just as we do, they carry in them a world of possibility and hope that we have an opportunity to help bring out.
In the coming pages, I will show that in the literature reviewed hospitality is very much what Sutherland explained it to be – a must for kingdom expansion. Jean Vanier of L’Arche says that “Welcome is one of the signs that community is alive.” He also states, “A community which refuses to welcome whether through fear, weariness, insecurity, a desire to cling to comfort, or just because it is fed up with visitors is dying spiritually (Pohl 2005) .” A community must be welcoming and hospitable. Part of its DNA must be set on bringing the stranger in so that they can go out as friends. We are God’s earthly hosts welcoming all into his house. Beyond the biblical and theological mandate I will show that hospitality has been a driving force behind church expansion in various eras of history, that there are discernable characteristics of hospitable people and places and that hospitality can and must be a key component of forming effective lifestyles for the formation of missional communities if the exurbs are to be influenced for the Kingdom of God[2].
Hospitality is a theme that is found through out the scriptures occurring direct situations 71 times throughout the biblical story (Alexander and Rosner 2000) . Hospitality literally means “love of strangers” and was a key component in the world of the Jews through out the biblical story and in the cultures of the Mideast (Youngblood et al. 1995) . Much of the ancient world saw hospitality as common good that was demanded of everyone. It was a virtue and those who were virtuous displayed hospitality by honoring guests and strangers.
Israelite hospitality extended beyond this ethic to a place of mandate as they saw in their calling out at Sinai a God given directive protect and go above and beyond in providing hospitality to all. They were to be the model and the launching pad for God’s hospitable gift to the world (Ryken et al. 1998) . Abraham their ancestor had been a sojourner and depended on hospitality and famously gave it. Coming out of Egypt God had provided for the people so they would graciously return the favor that had been placed upon them. They would be challenged to remember and “to know the heart of an alien, for you were once aliens in the land of Egypt.” (Exodus 23:9 NRSV)
Israel’s hospitality went beyond the customary provision and protection of the guest but lived out some basic well-designed ideas of what it meant to receive and send out a guest. The idea was that strangers would be changed to guests (Youngblood et al. 1995) [3]. Guests were welcomed and provided for through the customary washing of feet (Genesis 18:4, 19:2, 24:32) water, lodging and a meal was provided. This was not just a normal meal but also a meal that was the best that the host could provide[4].
The people of God also recognized that very early in their story the patriarch Abraham in Genesis 18 had entertained angels and provided them with provision and honor. He was blessed with the promise of a son within a year because of this action and the people often discussed that maybe sometimes we do entertain the divine. Some times angels visit us and we don’t know it so we should be vigilant (Hebrews 13:2). These divine appointments could be extraordinary and part of god’s redemptive story and the Israelites believed that there were times when divine messages or blessings from God came through strangers or angels (Richards 1997) [5].
Guests also seem to have a role in this relationship. Different than the Greco-Roman idea of hospitality, where I am blessed and bless in hopes of building a network for status and advancement, biblical guests are different. The biblical guest in receiving hospitality allows the host to use his or her gifts. The guest takes on a humble state allowing others to serve him or her. Being a guest is one way that we are taught humility and reminded that we need each other. The guest in the biblical world would receive the evaluation, the welcome rituals, and the sending away as a friend. The guest would show honor to the host by not overstaying their welcome – generally no more than two nights stay. Their ultimate goal was to come into a new strange place and leave as a honored righteous friend who did not disrupt the harmony of the home or community (Ryken et al. 1998) .
[1] As we will see in the paragraphs that follow on the scriptural mandate for hospitality and how it has been evidenced in history, hospitality has played a large part in the role of God’s work through out history. Odin as the “chord of redemption” refers to this stream of work. It runs through out time like a string or a chord that can be forever traced redeeming people along the way.
[2] I specifically chose the word lifestyles here because hospitality must become a lifestyle not a strategy; hospitality is way of life. The goal for leaders and missionaries is to live in a way that welcomes the stranger and the friend daily. This will look different in different moments and the radical quality of the endeavor will depend on our distance from the margins of society. Christine Pohl argues that in any instance we have one of three choices. We can stay where we are and refuse to challenge identity in terms of race, class, gender sexuality or assumed labels. We can we can approach the margin and work for empowerment of those who are there or we can identify with those who are in power and continue to neglect those who are “outside” (Russell and Shannon-Clarkson 2009) . So as we go forward we understand that in ever instance as we observe an opportunity with a stranger we can move toward them and work to empower them, we can side with the prevailing powers against them or we can simply do nothing. I believe that only one of these options works in the kingdom vision. This way of life as well must be given attention and nurtured because the results are not always immediate and the work is hard (Pohl 2005) .
[3] This process was a three step process of evaluating the stranger, receiving the stranger and sending the stranger out, now as a friend (Malina 1996) . We often see Jesus teaching when he enters an area. This could possibly be a means of verification of his authenticity. It is part of the evaluation. Paul goes through this as well (Acts 13:15) or presents letters (Romans 16:3, 1 Thess. 5:12-13). Jesus is once actually asked to leave (Mark 5:17). The guests or strangers are most often received and cared for. Only in instances when they are perceived as barbaric, beyond the ability to reason are they turned away. The barbarian it stands to reason would not allow himself to receive hospitality so in a way this takes care of itself. After being receive, the guest would after usually up to two days, be sent out with food and provisions. I will argue in later passages that this is where missional leaders and communities can recast their vision for what it means to be the church in lifestyle and in the community. I will also suggest a fourth step of empowerment and connection.
[4] A great symbol here is recognized when we consider the story of the prodigals in Luke 15. The father orders his servants “And get the fatted calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate;” (Luke 15:23 NRSV). The father is saying that the son has become a stranger but is welcomed back. He had reached a place of being unknown but the process is begun to change his identity. What if missional communities approached strangers in this way? What if we saw opportunity to throw a big party not to meet people or to help people know me or to show off how cool we are but to change the identity of those that surround us?
[5] This idea of entertaining angels unaware leads to a needed awareness of divine moments around us. We never know when our availability leads to a moment of God’s activity that includes us in a bigger story where people are transformed and our gifts are used.
Next: Hospitality, Part 2
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