Hospitality in Adoption and Beyond

 If you have been impacted by the Gospel for Jesus Christ, then as you open up the Bible, it’s hard to miss that you now have become an ambassador for Christ (2 Corinthians 5:17-20)…someone to represent Him and share the life changing message that changed your life for eternity. But in America we have some road blocks in sharing with others that much of the rest of the world does not have.

Any guesses? Our automatic garage doors.

America is one of the wealthiest nations in the world. We have homes that can easily fit more people, we have extra chairs in our living room, extra mugs for coffee or tea, and yet hospitality is a struggle for us.

We literally pull up our driveway, open our garage door, drive in, and then close it again. Without interacting with neighbors or those walking their dog right by our house every day. This wonderful convenience causes us to interact with people less.

I’ve been struck with how much hospitality literally opens the door for the Gospel to be shared.

Now, I personally love to host and open our home up to others. We have hosted a group in our home every week for years now to study the Bible, and it brings me so much joy that these individuals walk right in, make themselves at home, know exactly where the coffee is and feel welcomed. Our home is a gift from the Lord, so we do want to be intentional in using it for the Lord.

But I’m not always so giving, in all honestly. We have had numerous occasions where we have invited strangers to come into our home. We want our home to be a safe place in our community where others can come, feel loved and ask openly spiritual questions. However, inviting someone off the street, the unknown of who this person could be puts me on edge - we just said they are welcome in my ‘safe space.’

Home. My place of comfort, where I feel secure, where my most treasured possessions, my family sleeps every night. All of a sudden, my hospitable self thinks maybe I shouldn’t open up this home God gave us to just anybody. My fears of the world and the people in the world take over as every local news story flashes before my eyes.

How did my missional eyes adjust when it affects me more personally? Or how am I to say I have lines on who comes in and when? Fear, my time, my status begins to dictate who and how I am hospitable.

Bringing someone new into your home could threaten your comfort, it could throw off the dynamic in your home, could hurt your trust, or simply damage or take your material treasures. But if you are willing to risk, it shows a stranger that you love, that you share, that you are ready to serve them…that they are worthy to be invited in. And in the words of David Platt, that is ‘Counter Culture.’

These past few weeks, the topic of hospitality stood out to me, and here are some take aways (credit servantleaderstraining.com):

• Hospitality is essential to the spread of the Gospel
• Hospitality is a means of blessing and relationship
• Hospitality is motivated by God’s hospitality to us
• Hospitality is commanded
• Hospitality can be uncomfortable
• Hospitality is necessary for growth

Home is always an understood place that exposes much about us. Inviting others into one’s home is a universal invitation to vulnerability, trust and increasing levels of intimacy: Homes are where Jesus did much of His ministry.

The strength of the church is compounded when believers see their homes as kingdom outposts for prayer, evangelism, training and fellowship.

Now as I write this I think of the times we have gone door to door in our neighborhood inviting others to our home. But read the above takeaways again, and look at it through the lenses of orphan care. How many families discourage their loves ones to adopt because having someone of a different color in their home is ‘uncomfortable?’ Or how quickly we forget the effort Christ went through on the cross so we could be a part of the family of God - surely the effort of foster care it too much for me, right? Or we don’t see caring for children without families as a command to us, but it’s someone else’s command? HEAR ME, I’m guilty of these thoughts -> which is why the very first take away is my foundation as I look at orphan care from now on!

Opening our home, loving someone as our own, sharing our lives is ESSENTIAL to truly showing the love of Christ and spreading the Gospel. And if I’m an ambassador for Christ, this is MY PURPOSE in life!

And I promise, once you begin opening your home and lives, there may be some hurts, but the blessings and the impact on others will far out weigh any discomfort to the indescribable joy of being used by the Lord with what He has given you! To bless others!