A Sermon - The Ministry of Hospitality

A Sermon Delivered on 29 April 2012 at Oak Grove Community Church.

1.            Over the last couple of weeks, we have been focusing on a very important truth – Jesus Christ is the only hope.  He is our Lord and Savior.  One of the central confessions of the church is that Jesus is the true Lord.  And our hope is that one day the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, Jesus Christ, will return to earth and save those who have put their hope in him.  This proclamation is an essential teaching of the church. We have to remember that we are not only called to proclaim Jesus as Lord, ss the body of Christ, the church is called to be a living hope.  We have to remember that being a living hope is not only something that we are looking forward to, it is something that we are called to live out right now.  Being a living hope is actually a ministry.  We are called to be the ministry of hope to a world full of despair. 

2.            The Ministry of Presence – Last week, we began talking about what it looks like in every day life to be a living hope in this world.  The first way that we are a living hope is to be a ministry of presence.  God’s Word teaches that when Jesus Christ came to earth as a human, he came as “God with us.”  The very presence of God was in Jesus Christ.  The Bible also teaches that you and I are the temple of the Holy Spirit – the Comforter.  And the Bible teaches that we are called to be a ministry of the presence of God, to comfort one another and to be a ministry of the presence of God in our homes, in our neighborhood, and at our jobs.  When we are the living hope of presence, we bring hope to people in their most difficult seasons of life.

3.            Today, I want to talk about another facet of the church being a ministry of hope – the ministry of hospitality.  A very important virtue, but one that lacks the attention that it needs, is the virtue of hospitality.  In fact, God’s Word emphasizes it often.  I think that we often forget how important this is to God.

4.            The Greek word that is translated into English as “hospitality” is a compound word of two Greek words – philos and zenos.  You have probably heard the first word before – philos, which is simply “love.”  The second word, zenos, means “stranger or foreigner.”  When you put those two words together, you get “loving strangers” or “showing love to strangers in your midst.”  Hospitality is essentially making sure that strangers are treated with love and service.

4.            God has a lot to say about hospitality in the Bible.  I want to talk about these principles of hospitality.  The first principle is that Jesus is our example of hospitality.  If the ministry of presence is the first ministry that Jesus did as a human, the second is the ministry of hospitality.  In other words, Jesus Christ welcomed people to be with him.  He welcomed people from all walks of life.  He welcomed religious people and pagans.  He welcomed people who were wealthy and those that were poor.  He welcomed the righteous, and he welcomed sinners.  The reason that Jesus is our hope is that he welcomes us, not matter how we come to him.  Jesus welcomed the sinner.  Matthew 11:19 says, “The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Here is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and ‘sinners.”’  Jesus welcomed sinners so much that the religious people lumped him in with them.  They called him a glutton and a drunkard.  But Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.  Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.  For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” 

            Over and over again, we see Jesus spending time with people that religious people would never associate with. 

5.            Hospitality is never mistreating a stranger.  Pride causes this. 

6.            Hospitality is not just being friendly.  It is something that you do.  It is taking care of the needs of others – Rom 12:13; Lev 25:35.

7.            Hospitality is an essential virtue of leadership in the church.  One of the qualifications for leadership in the church, and the wives of leaders in the church, is the virtue of hospitality.  Before a leader is chosen, they must already hospitable.  In other words, they look for strangers and go out of their way to make sure that a visitor or guest in their midst feels at home.  The Apostle Paul, when he was describing the essential characteristics of leadership in the Church in 1 Tim 3:2, said, “Now the overseer must be above, the husband of but one wife, temperate, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable . . .”  Being a hospitable person is essential to being a good leader in the church. 

8.            I want to give you this last principle of hospitality, but I want to do this with an attitude of humility because I don’t want to come across as spiritually superior.  This last principle is one that should cause us pause and understand how important the virtue of hospitality is to our Lord, Jesus Christ.  Here is the principle:  On the Day of Judgment, we will be judged on how we treat the stranger.  Jesus will judge us on how hospitable we are.  Let’s look at Matt 25:31ff.:

When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his throne in heavenly glory.  All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.  He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.  Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world.  For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’  Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink?  When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you?  When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’  The king will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’

There are two things I would like to take away from this passage of Scripture.  First, you get the sense that hospitality is much more that just being friendly.  Hospitality includes taking care of peoples’ needs.  Second, when you show hospitality to people, you are doing it to Jesus.  In a deeply spiritual way, you are serving Jesus when you go out of your way to love the stranger.  Let’s continue with this verse and see how Jesus views people that do not love the stranger:

Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels.  For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink.  I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’  They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help?’ He will reply, ‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’  They will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.

9.            Paul says in Romans 12.13 to “Practice hospitality.”  What does that look like?  Let me give you some simple ways to practice hospitality at Oak Grove Community Church.  The first and most obvious way to show hospitality at Oak Grove Community Church is to smile! One of the chief complaints of people outside of the Christian faith is that we are judgmental people.  They say that we are known more for what we are against than what we are for.  Let’s face it, folks, we Christians can be sour people.  But of all the people of the world, we who have our hope in Jesus Christ, should be full of joy!  Paul says in Philippians 4:4 – 7, “Rejoice in the Lord always.  I will say it again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all.  The Lord is near.  Do not be anxious about anything . . .”  Paul says in 1 Thessalonians 5:16 says, “Be joyful always…”  Yet, sometimes we walk in the door of the church sour. 

            I love what Carnegie said in his bestselling book, How to Win Friends and Influence People.  When I read that, I decided to try it.  So, I went out that day and smiled at the people I came in contact with.  I remember one person in particular.  I was in a convenience store and I was the third person in line.  It was obvious that the cashier was not having her best day.  At first, I thought I would look like an idiot and almost didn’t do it.  This lady did not look like she was in the mood.  But, when I walked up to the counter, I smiled as big as I could.  As soon as she saw me, she couldn’t help it.  She started smiling and was as nice as she could be to me.  It was amazing how her demeanor changed.  I practice this often.  It is amazing how people’s attitudes change when you simply smile. 

            It think that now would be a wonderful for us to practice right now.  I would like everyone to stand up.  I want you to go find someone you don’t know, stick out your hand, smile real big, and say, “Welcome to Oak Grove.”

            See how easy that was!  When people come to Oak Grove, I want them to experience the joy of the Lord.  The first thing that people should see from us is a big smile and a warm welcome.

10.            The second principle of hospitality is to go out of our way to make our guests feel at home.  In fact, real hospitality is when a guest comes into our church, it should be like a long lost friend is found.  We should be that excited.  By the time a guest leaves, they should feel like they have been in the presence of Jesus just by our conversation.  Let me show you what that should look like.  In Matthew 18:10, Jesus told this parable:

See that you do not look down on one of these little ones.  For I tell you that their angels in heaven always see the face of my Father in heaven.  What do you think?  If a man owns a hundred sheep, and one of them wanders away, will he not leave the ninety-nine on the hills and go to look for the one that wandered off?  And if he finds it, I tell you the truth, he is happier about that one sheep than about the ninety-nine that did not wander off.  In the same way your Father in heaven is not willing that any of these little ones should be lost.

            Just like Jesus is happy when the one sheep is found, we should treat our guests just like that shepherd.  As comfortable as we are with our friends, we need to leave our friends at church and go find the guest and welcome them just like we would a long lost friend.