Why Hospitality Matters

Dannah Gresh: Do you want to fight self-centeredness? Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth says there’s one step you can take: invite someone over.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: I have to tell you, my bent is to be selfish. And hospitality is a way of running into the face of that selfishness and breaking down that natural selfish instinct.

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Choosing Gratitude, for Monday, April 8, 2024. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Today I’m joined by my dear friend Erin Davis. She’s the author of Connected: Curing the Pandemic of Everyone Feeling Alone Together. Welcome Erin.

Erin Davis: Any day I get to spend time with you is a good day. I’m glad to be with you.

Dannah: Me, too! I’m glad you’re here. There is so much to talk about. But before we get to our main topic, I want to play something Nancy shared in the early days of Revive Our Hearts. This was way back in 2002.

Nancy: Think about the kind of day we are living in. This is a world where people tend to put up high walls around themselves. I think of the words lonely, fearful, and suspicious when I think of this culture. There are so many people who are wounded, people who are detached because they have been hurt in relationships.

It's a world of broken relationships, a world of rejection and isolation, drive-by shootings, and crime. People tend to kind of hunker down in their little fortresses and be fearful and barricade themselves behind these locked doors and high walls.

They lock themselves in their cars. They drive into their gated communities, and they drive in their garages, put down the door, go in their house, lock the door, and sometimes just don't come out for their job.

Dannah: That was twenty-two years ago, but I think that sense of isolation Nancy just described, let me ask you, Erin, as it gotten worse or better?

Erin: Well, if I have to choose one of those two options, I think I’d say “worse.” But Nancy said something interesting there; she talked about people “leaving their houses for work.” I’m going to make a confession: I’m in my flip-flops as we’re recording this because I work from home! And many, many of us do.

So even that rhythm that would have necessitated connecting with other people. For a lot of us, we don’t even have that to tether us, so a lot has changed.

Dannah: A lot has changed! Let’s just go through this list. Some of the things that she described are very much the same: the loneliness, the fearfulness, the suspicion—although they’re worse, I think.

How much do you think they’ve been made worse by the pandemic and the political division that we’ve experienced in the last few years?

Erin: Not to mention, social media. I mean, what we know to be true about social media is that it can narrow our opinions, because very often we’re fed by people who look like us and think like us, so that certainly has had a magnifying effect.

And you’re right, the political tension is high. It just kind of stays high. It used to ebb and flow. It doesn’t feel like it ebbs and flows much anymore. We’re certainly suspicious of one another. Some of those are just human nature things because we’re fallen, but there are things that are happening culturally that seem to encourage . . .

Dannah: They’re aggravating it.

Erin: Aggravating it. Absolutely, that’s the right phrase.

Dannah: You know what I’m thinking, Erin? Not only are people not leaving for work, I have several family members who work remotely. Sometimes I’m really concerned about that fact. I think socialization would be really good for their emotions and their mental health, but so many people haven’t returned to the rhythm of even getting out to church since the pandemic! 

Erin: Yes, c’mon! That’s an important one! And it’s not because of the reasons we first isolated. The pandemic has come and gone. In fact, I say, “It’s the pandemic which shall not be named.” It’s like people want to act like it didn’t happen.

But it did create new life and family rhythms that at this point have become very entrenched, and I’m concerned. If you’re a follower of Jesus and you’re not gathering with other followers of Jesus regularly, all the alarm bells are going off in my heart and mind for you.

Dannah: Yes, this is your invitation back. That’s what I’m going to say.

Erin: Yes! Come to my church, I’ll save a seat for you. Just find a Bible-teaching church!

Dannah: That’s right. So, the kind of loneliness Nancy described all those years ago is still here, and maybe to a greater degree. That’s why I’m so excited about this series we’re about to begin. It’s not exactly about loneliness and isolation, rather a cure for loneliness and isolation.

We’re going to be talking about biblical hospitality. Nancy’s teaching on that topic is biblical and timeless and so needed for today. Erin, you’ve been going through that classic teaching and, I guess, sort of refreshing and revising it for where we are today. What are you observing?

Erin: Yes, in my role as the Content Director for Revive Our Hearts, I get to work on a lot of great projects. We took this classic Nancy series and re-formed it into a Bible study (myself and Katie, who is another writer on the team).

We were the only two working on this study for months and months. We would message each other all the time: “This is so good! This is so convicting! Wow, the church needs this!” There’s been this excitement just bubbling in us.

This feels like a message “for such a time as this.” Even though it’s timeless and it’s classic, it does feel like there’s an invitation from the Lord through Nancy’s series—which became this study—to invite the church to pick back up the mantle of biblical hospitality and face what’s on the line if we don’t. There are a lot bigger stakes than you might think.

I would go so far as to say our witness to the world is on the line based on whether or not we’re willing to invite other people into our homes.

Dannah: Okay, now I’m about to “get up onto a soap box.” Just as many people in the church have stopped going to church, to an even greater degree, the lost are less likely to walk into the doors of church. But they will stop and have lemonade on your front porch, or they’ll have s’mores around your campfire in the backyard. So this is a gospel issue right now, the issue of hospitality, in a way that it probably wasn't when Nancy first taught this series.

Erin: Yes, disillusionment among the lost is very high right now, but their need and their craving for connection is just as high. And so, Dannah, you and I have talked many times that our days of just opening the doors of the church and expecting the lost to kind of stumble in and hear a good sermon and surrender their lives to Jesus . . . We’re not in those days right now. But we are in days where people are searching. Every human heart craves an invitation to be with others—especially if there’s good food. So it’s an opportunity.

Dannah: If there are Erin Davis’s chocolate chip cookies, I’m definitely there! 

Alright, Erin, as we’ve pulled out this classic teaching, we’ve added a really cool element to it. Tell us about that.

Erin: Oh, man, I am so excited about this! A team of us from Revive Our Hearts traveled to many different places and met lots of different kinds of people who were showing hospitality. 

I mean, I’m talking about Afghan refugees who had fled when it fell to the Taliban and experiencing hospitality from a Christian family that welcomed them in. I’m talking about a single woman in a tiny apartment with limited resources who finds ways to use what she has for the glory of God. I’m talking about a whole church in California that has adopted a family, as a church. This is a family with some very intense medical needs, and this family has moved toward them. They’re serving as caregivers, but they’re also just extending hospitality over and over again.

As I sat in big living rooms and little living rooms and kitchens where there was elaborate food and kitchens where there was literally just chips and queso and experienced the hospitality of the church, I was just re-energized for this message . . . and the reality that all of us can do this. We can! 

All of our excuses don’t add up when we open God’s Word and see that He calls us! In Romans, Scripture says, “Show hospitality!” (Romans 12:13). It’s not in a suggested format. This is our responsibility as God’s people.

Dannah: It’s a command. 

Erin: Absolutely! 

Dannah: Okay, I love everything you just said, I can’t wait for this series! One thing I take issue with: I don't think you should put the word “just” in front of “queso and chips.” We should probably edit that, post-production.

Erin: (laughter) You’re right! I receive that. Queso and chips are amazing! 

Well, we’re going to hear all those wonderful stories as this series unfolds, but let’s get us kicked off with Nancy’s teaching.

Nancy: Over these next few weeks, we want to talk about an aspect of the Christian life that is often overlooked. I think it is one of the most neglected areas of the Christian life and one that some consider optional. I’m talking about the ministry of hospitality. 

I have to tell you that over these last few weeks as I’ve been studying in preparation for this series, this has been one of the most exciting studies that I’ve been able to do in a long time.

I had never realized until I got into the Scripture and started digging out what the Word has to say about hospitality, how important this subject is to God, and how important of a subject this is to our culture.

When you read about hospitality in the biblical days, it’s easy to think, That is something they did in their culture because they didn’t have hotels and restaurants. Now we don’t need to have people in our homes or show hospitality in the same way.

I began to meditate on the principles of hospitality and God’s heart behind hospitality, and I realized our culture needs this ministry maybe even more than any previous culture. 

I know there are a lot of people today when they think about going home for the holidays that there is this sense of dread. They kind of get a sick feeling in their stomachs because for so many people today, “home” is a hurtful word rather than something to look forward to. 

Think about it. Today, we rarely set out on the front porch and talk to friends, neighbors, or even people inside our own homes. Even in our churches, isn’t it true that we can see some of the same people week after week. We nod at them, we smile at them, we exchange a few words, but we don’t really know each other. We don’t know each other’s pains, struggles, each other’s hearts, each other’s needs, each other’s joys, each other’s failures. We just don’t know each other.

The ministry of hospitality is a powerful weapon for breaking down walls, for breaking down barriers—barriers among believers. And it’s a weapon for penetrating our culture with the gospel of Jesus Christ—a culture that is so wounded and hurt.

Some of you are accustomed to hospitality. I look around the room, and I see some who are the “hostess with the mostest.” You know what a blessing and joy this ministry can be. But for some people when I say “hospitality,” your blood pressure goes up and you get a little nervous about the thought of opening your home and having to entertain people and all that is involved in doing this. 

Maybe you’re not comfortable with the idea of hospitality. You may be thinking, I am so busy! Or maybe you’re thinking, No way! You should see my house, it’s a wreck! Or, I hate to cook! Or, I live in an apartment with three other roommates. There is no way I could practice hospitality! Or, We just can’t afford to add more people to our table! Or, this is one I think a lot of people think, I just don’t have the gift of hospitality.

Before you tune out of this subject and think that this subject does not matter to you or that you are not particularly interested in it, let me just tell you, “If you are not currently practicing hospitality, you don’t know what you are missing out on.” I hope that over these next days you’ll come to realize that this is something that can be a great blessing not only in your life but a means of your giving blessing to others.

 

I want to give you quickly here ten reasons why you’ll want to know about this subject. Now don't try and jot all these down because we will come back to them over the next several days and expand on different ones.

Let me just give you in rapid-fire succession ten reasons that you want to know about this subject . . . or that you need to hear about this subject.

Number one: Hospitality is one of the most practical ways to express the love of Christ. That's how people know that we love them and that we love each other as believers is through hospitality.

Number two: Hospitality reflects the hospitable heart of God. This is a thought that has really affected my thinking over the last few days. We have a God who is hospitable. When we practice hospitality, we show the world what He is like.

Number three: Hospitality is a great way to build unity and community with other believers. It’s a way to really get to know each other. Getting into each other's lives just does not happen within the four walls of the church. That's where we can meet each other. But then when we come into the context of our homes, that's where we break bread, we break down barriers, and we create a climate for true fellowship and love to be experienced.

Number four: The Bible promises rewards for those who practice hospitality. There are some blessings that you will never experience unless you are opening your home to others.

Those rewards, by that way, are not only here on earth. There are rewards in heaven promised for those who practice hospitality.

Number five: Hospitality is one of the most effective ways to create a hunger for Christ in the hearts of non-believers. Some people who won't go in the door of a church will come into your home. That's where we can begin to share with them the love of Christ.

Number six: Hospitality will help you deal with loneliness and depression. I think of some singles or those who are widowed or divorced and live by themselves and have to deal with loneliness and discouragement, hospitality is one way of dealing with that.

Number seven: Hospitality will help us deal with selfishness. Now, I know we have no problem with selfishness among anyone here in this room, but I have to tell you that my bent is to be selfish. Hospitality is a way of running into the face of that selfishness and breaking down that natural selfish instinct.

Number eight: Hospitality will help you deal with materialism and help you get values that are eternal.

Number nine: If you have children, hospitality is a great way to cultivate in your children a heart for ministry and a heart for serving other people.

Number ten: If there were no other reasons this would be sufficient reason, and that is that God commands us to be hospitable. If you are a child of God, I have news for you: hospitality is not an option. We are commanded to be hospitable. He says that this is for every believer, something every child of God must do.

In fact, almost every New Testament author talks about the importance of hospitality. Let me just read a few of those commands.

We read in 1 Peter 4:9, "Be hospitable to one another without grumbling." 

Then in Romans 12:10–12 Paul says, "Be kindly affectionate to one another with brotherly love . . . pursuing hospitality" (paraphrased).

Hebrews 13:2, "Don't forget to entertain strangers." 

What is he saying? Don't neglect hospitality. Make sure you pursue it. Now, it's easy to think that hospitality is something that just relates to women. After all, we think of women having to do more of the work around the house when we are having company over.

It's interesting in the Scripture that hospitality is a command not just for women and not just for some believers but for men and women. Both are expected to be hospitable. In fact, did you know in the New Testament, when the apostle Paul gives the list of requirements for someone who's going to be in spiritual leadership in the church—as a pastor, an elder, or a deacon—one of the requirements is that he must be hospitable.

It's right there in the list in 1 Timothy and in Titus, along with able to teach. Now everyone realizes a pastor should be able to teach. But did you realize that if a man is going to be qualified to be a spiritual leader in the church, he also has to be hospitable.

In hospitality he is going to show a servant's heart, an open heart, a shepherd's heart for the flock. If he's going to be a good shepherd of God's people, he needs to have a hospitable heart.

By the way, if the man has a hospitable heart but his wife is reluctant in this area, she can actually hinder her husband from meeting the qualifications or requirements that God has set up for him to be a spiritual leader.

Then in 1 Timothy, Paul tells us that if a widow is going to qualify to receive financial support from the local church, one of the qualifications she has to meet is that she has lodged strangers; she has been hospitable. So God says to men and to women, "Be hospitable, open your heart, open your home to those who have needs."

I have been amazed at how this theme of hospitality runs through the Scripture—I mean from Genesis to Revelation.

Over these next days, we are going to look at some of the Old Testament passages and some of the New Testament passages about what it means to be hospitable and why this is such a reflection of the heart of God and how the ministry of hospitality actually communicates the gospel.

Hospitality takes us back to the cross. It takes us to the heart of Christ as He gave Himself and His life for the salvation of the world.

So, we are going to examine what the Scripture has to say about this important area of ministry. Along the way, here are some of the questions we are going to address. 

• What is Christian hospitality? Some of us have never seen it modeled and we aren’t sure what it really means to be hospitable.
• Why is it important? 
• Why should we be hospitable? 
• What are some of the obstacles to hospitality? And how we we deal with them?

We'll talk about some of the rewards and the benefits of hospitality. Then we want to talk about how we can show hospitality to others.

Let me say that the ministry of hospitality can be a means of ministering grace and healing and mercy and reconciliation to people around you and me that your pastor may never be able to reach, your church may not reach, but you can reach—your family, your home. You can reach even as a single woman. You can reach people, bridge the gap to their hearts, show them the love and mercy of Christ through the ministry of hospitality.

Let’s pray. Thank You, Father, that You have extended hospitality to us. That You’ve invited us to come into Your home to live with You. We thank You that You’ve given us a home, a place, where we can minister hospitality to others.

Lord, we confess that in many cases we have neglected this ministry. I pray that over these next days that You would show us to enter into one of the richest and most rewarding ministries that You have available to us.

I pray, Lord, that through this study we would have Your heart, the heart of hospitality. I pray in Jesus’ name, amen.

Dannah: I’m so excited to see how God answers that prayer and calls all of us to grow in displaying a heart of hospitality. 

We call this one of Nancy’s classic teaching series. They’re classic for a reason; they are rich.

Here are a couple ways to keep filling your heart with this matter of hospitality. For one thing, keep listening to this series on Revive Our Hearts called, “You’re Welcome Here.” You can find this series as well as videos and other resources on hospitality on our website—go to ReviveOurHearts.com/hospitality. 

And here’s something else you can do. Get a copy of the new Bible study based on Nancy’s teaching. It’s also called, You’re Welcome Here. This is a six-week study that will take you deeper into the heart of hospitality.

We’d love to send you a copy as our thanks when you make a donation of any amount to Revive Our Hearts. Just visit ReviveOurHearts.com, or call 1-800-569-5959.

My guest cohost, Erin Davis, helped put this Bible study together, and she’s also been touring the country talking with women about biblical hospitality.

Erin: That’s right. I feel like I probably texted or called you from the road and said, “Dannah, this is amazing! Then the teaching today that we heard, Nancy mentioned easy-to-come-up-with excuses. In the study we call them “hospitality hangups.”

Those might be the reasons that we think, I’m off the hook. I talked to Katie Laitkep about that. On the surface, it might seem that Katie does have some valid reasons to avoid showing hospitality! 

Katie Laitkep: We all have our phones, and in theory, when you wake up in the morning your phone is charged overnight, and it’s at 100 percent. Some of us start the day at 100 percent, some of us do not.

I think a lot of us who have chronic illnesses or other situations, we may start the day at 50 percent—or possibly even lower, depending on your life circumstances. And so I with Lyme Disease start the day at a lower percentage than I would like . . . and throughout the day as I work. I work for Revive Our Hearts, but it takes energy during the day, and so my “battery” starts to decrease. There are normally not opportunities to go take a nap and recharge, so it just keeps going down.

By the end of the day when I would like to love friends over, I may be down to like 7 percent. I want to extend hospitality to them and have them in my home, or a lot of times we’ll go out and have a meal together. Or, we’ll all have been so tired of sitting at our desks that we’ll say, “We’re going to the park. We need to just walk and be together while we’re moving.” But I may be meeting up with them at 7 percent.

And I know that by the end of the night, conversation’s going to take it out of me. If I have to prepare a meal, that’s also going to have a cost to it. And so, I just can kind of feel it ticking down.

Erin: I love that picture, because I have been that woman. I think lots of other women are going to say, “Okay, we’re reading the Bible, too. We see all these places . . .” And, there are lots of places where Scripture, I think I’d say, “commands,” hospitality among God’s people. “But at the end of the day, I’m at 7 percent,” or “I’m at 3 percent. I don’t have anything to give.”

You’re writing them such a beautiful permission slip, “Yeah, okay, then don’t have them in your home if you don’t have the energy to get your home presentable.” Although we think that your home doesn’t have to be perfect. Don’t feel like you have to cook the meal. That’s actually not at the heart of hospitality.

What is the heart? If you could peel back those layers, and say you’re at a 7 percent battery day and you still want to live out the heart of hospitality, what’s at the core?

Katie: Well, I think you could look at it either way: “Man, I only have 7 percent left, and I’m about to go to bed, and I can feel it going down.” But you can also think of it as, “I have 7 percent left!” And our call as believers is to serve the Lord with everything we have. I think that means everything we have each day within the limitations and context of our lives. In my world there are pretty strong fences that I have to play within, but there is a lot of room still that I get to work with.

I think the heart of hospitality is to serve the Lord with what He’s given us. My time, my resources, my heart, my energy, all of these things . . . I may not have as much as someone else, but I want to steward all of it and offer it back to the Lord as, “This is my offering to You, this is my sacrifice to You. I want to take this and give it back.”

A lot of times that means taking it and not pouring it back into myself, but taking what He’s given me, and using it to serve other people.

Dannah: That conversation between Erin Davis and Katie Laitkep is part of a video series called “You’re Welcome Here.” So if you want to take steps to show hospitality, we have a proposal for you.

Erin: Get a copy of the Bible study You’re Welcome Here. Don’t stop there. Organize a group of women to go through this study with you. I’m planning on leading it with my home Bible study group that meets in my house. 

Each week for six weeks, get together—show hospitality. Eat some chips and queso and watch one of these six videos that the team and I have produced. Then discuss it . . . together. 

Dannah: Can I come and join your group? Well, maybe I should have my own study group. Thanks Erin for being with me as a guest cohost today. We should do that more often!

Erin: I agree.

Dannah: To get your copy of You’re Welcome Here and to find out more about the video series, visit ReviveOurHearts.com/hospitality.

What does being hospitable really mean? We’re going to look at some examples of that tomorrow. Please be back for Revive Our Hearts.

This program is a listener-supported production of Revive Our Hearts in Niles, Michigan, calling women to freedom, fullness, and fruitfulness in Christ.

All Scripture is taken from the NKJV unless otherwise noted.

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