I was thinking today about how hospitable many of the refugee families are that I meet. They invite us into their home, get out a little tray and glasses and serve us the ever famous orange drink “tang” or tea and fruit. They don’t mind visitors just “dropping by”. Many times I see them sharing their belongings, watching each other’s children. The front door to their apartment is always open- many times people don’t knock they just come right in. They come from close knit communities in the refugee camps where life was more communal. In fact, many have come to the states with Aunts, Uncles, Grandma and Grandpa etc… I laugh to myself sometimes thinking that they live closer to their biological family than I do.
Hospitality is such a beautiful and rare thing. Hospitality is more than an open home but also an open heart. It is being willing to open your home and your life for others to be a part of, so that they can see Christ in you. It is easy to be friends with or open your home and heart to those that are like you or easy to get along with, but it is much harder to open yourself up to those who are different from you or the poor or disadvantaged. One of the things that I have found as I have opened up my home to several refugee ladies and their families spending time with them every week, sharing bible stories, eating lunch, cooking together, helping one another, is that we became heart friends. And as they have come into the kingdom we have become sisters in Christ.
As we invite people to spend time with us, when we are doing the daily things like, cooking, folding laundry, running errands, watching the kids, you are able to talk and bond and share your heart. I try to make an intentional effort to spend time in God’s word with them, by sharing a story to encourage or challenge them from his word. This takes real intentionality because for me it is easy to make friends but harder to share about spiritual things. But we must “go there” in our friendships. They are like sheep without a shepherd, let your compassion and the Holy Spirit lead you to share Jesus with them.
As they learn about Jesus and see Jesus in us it is amazing. Odalys (a Cuban refugee friend) would say after spending time with me and hearing the bible stories over lunch that she loved our time, she felt peace, and she looked forward to it every week. It was the only place she felt peace in her life was during that time. She eventually gave her life to Christ.
My challenge to you is- how many of your relationships are “easy”, meaning old friends that you love and spend lots of time with. Have you opened up your heart and time to the lost and hurting? Are you mentoring anyone who is younger in the faith? Maybe it is a neighborhood kid, a neighbor, a refugee, a lonely person you know? This should probably be a little bit of a stretch for you.
This kind of hospitality definitely takes sacrifice and discipline to carve out that time for them.
I have personally desired for an older woman in the Lord to open up her heart and home to me for a spiritual mentoring relationship that is also a form of hospitality. I have this kind of relationship with few women and I cherish those relationships. My mom, my mother-in-law Ruth, and my husband’s Aunt Rosene have done this for me. But I long for more of these kinds of relationships. So women we need to realize that many ladies will not ask us for this kind of relationship, we have to offer it and you will be surprised how they will respond.
This also leads to an interesting topic. We have to have a simplified life and schedule to be able to practice this kind of hospitality. It takes time, quantity and quality. I pray that God will grow us in this way as we desire to live for Him.
Romans 12:12-14 (New International Version)
12Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. 13Share with God’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality.
14Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse.
1 Peter 4:8-10 (New International Version)
8Above all, love each other deeply, because love covers over a multitude of sins. 9Offer hospitality to one another without grumbling. 10Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others, faithfully administering God’s grace in its various forms.
1 Comment
September 11, 2009 at 3:30 am
Wow, is all I can say. If I lived near you I would count it such a great honor to be an older woman mentor to you, but truthfully you would only be mentoring me Beth – what a Giant in the Faith you are !!! God has grown you up Mighty in Himself !!! Stay In the Battle as the old Rabbi use to say !