Anna Moore: We could just keep doing that, right?
Anna Moore: That's beautiful, beautiful.
Anna Moore: Thank you, ladies.
Anna Moore: Well, thank you again.
Anna Moore: This is my last time.
Anna Moore: You'll have another uh small group time, which I know is always beneficial.
Anna Moore: I hope you all had a a lovely time with those.
Anna Moore: Thank you again for the lunch and just the the warm hospitality, which is what we're about to talk to, that we have been shown today.
Anna Moore: So, can we give the team a thank a big round of applause for thank you?
Anna Moore: Amen.
Anna Moore: Much goes on behind the scenes for many months leading up to this.
Anna Moore: And so thank you, ladies.
Anna Moore: It has been delightful.
Anna Moore: So I want to show you a picture of my family.
Anna Moore: Do we have that?
Anna Moore: Almost.
Anna Moore: There we go.
Anna Moore: There it is.
Anna Moore: So we uh celebrated 40 years of wedded bliss, July 20th of 85.
Anna Moore: I mean July 20th of this past year.
Anna Moore: We got married in July 20th uh of 85.
Anna Moore: But this is the first time we'd all been together in about a year and a half.
Anna Moore: This was in August.
Anna Moore: We all met down in Georgia and uh thankfully had a weekend together.
Anna Moore: Um so Ed and I are in the middle, our oldest son Parker on the right with his wife and their five.
Anna Moore: Uh right, right there, Millie.
Anna Moore: Where are you, Millie?
Anna Moore: Is Millie there?
Anna Moore: Millie, that's Millie right there, right, right there.
Anna Moore: So the little baby in her arms is Millie.
Anna Moore: Yes.
Anna Moore: So I loved Millie from the moment I met her last night.
Anna Moore: And then our son Charlie and his um wife and their five kids.
Anna Moore: Charlie and Molly actually had their wedding reception right over in that room where we were back, oh, I don't know, 10, 12, 15 years ago, however long that's been.
Anna Moore: And then uh Savannah and Drew and their little boy Callahan, my daughter Savannah, and my daughter Madison, right there by me.
Anna Moore: So thankful for my family.
Anna Moore: I wanted you to see that because I love my family.
Anna Moore: Plus, I wanted you to see the people that both endured and benefited from our showing hospitality over the years.
Anna Moore: So let me pray one more time for us.
Anna Moore: Father, thank you for uh just a delightful day.
Anna Moore: Thank you, God, for your word.
Anna Moore: Thank you for the already the work of your spirit, and I pray that you would continue working in us uh this hour.
Anna Moore: Lord, help me in Jesus' name.
Anna Moore: Amen.
Anna Moore: So there's so many areas that we could have looked at that deal with obedience from a changed heart, but again, we chose the tongue and hospitality.
Anna Moore: And this subject is near and dear to my heart, the subject of hospitality.
Anna Moore: And it is one big area that should grow and flow from a heart of flesh, from a changed heart, from a Christian's heart, the area of hospitality.
Anna Moore: So I'm excited to end this conference with this topic.
Anna Moore: I hope you are alert.
Anna Moore: I hope you had enough coffee and sweets that you're not on that sugar low, but you're still on that sugar high.
Anna Moore: Um, so we have again been the recipients of much good food, much hospitality, but stick with me on this one.
Anna Moore: I think it'll be a fun one as well as convicting.
Anna Moore: So try to try to hang in there.
Anna Moore: So, Roman numeral one, hospitality in the gospel.
Anna Moore: I had a lady ask me, go slower, repeat the things for the for the uh the blanks.
Anna Moore: And I looked at this handout just now.
Anna Moore: There are no blanks, so I think you'll be okay.
Anna Moore: Hospitality and the gospel.
Anna Moore: The gospel is of first importance.
Anna Moore: Everything we do in our Christian walk should be done through the lens of the gospel, not through legalism or guilt, but keeping the gospel in focus.
Anna Moore: Now, these verses are not on the screen.
Anna Moore: I decided uh it later on that I wanted to look at these in the Bible.
Anna Moore: Actually, I wanted you to read them.
Anna Moore: So I'm gonna ask you to turn in your Bibles or the Pew Bible, the phone app, whatever.
Anna Moore: Actually look at them.
Anna Moore: 1 Corinthians 15, verses 1 through 4.
Anna Moore: 1 Corinthians 15, 1 through 4, and then we're gonna move over to Colossians.
Anna Moore: But I want to read 1 Corinthians 15, 1 through 4 for you, remembering the gospel, hospitality and the gospel.
Anna Moore: Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preach to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preach to you, unless you believed in vain.
Anna Moore: For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the scriptures.
Anna Moore: So, ladies, that's what we mean when we say the gospel is of first importance.
Anna Moore: You'll hear that phrase.
Anna Moore: That's where that comes from.
Anna Moore: Paul is saying to the church at Corinth, this is of utmost, of first importance, the gospel.
Anna Moore: And he spells out what that gospel is.
Anna Moore: And then I love these verses in Colossians 1.
Anna Moore: Go to Colossians chapter 1, verses 3 through 6.
Anna Moore: Colossians 1, 3 through 6.
Anna Moore: We always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you, since we heard of your faith in Christ Jesus, and of the love that you have for all the saints, because of the hope laid up for you in heaven.
Anna Moore: Of this you have heard before in the word of truth, the gospel, which has come to you, as indeed in the whole world it is bearing fruit and increasing, as it also does among you since the day you heard it and understood the grace of God and truth.
Anna Moore: I I think I didn't know until about, I don't know, 20 years ago that these verses actually were in the Bible.
Anna Moore: Ladies, I did not understand that the gospel was for believers as well as unbelievers.
Anna Moore: And it was life-changing when I discovered that as a Christian.
Anna Moore: We should never relegate the gospel to lost people only.
Anna Moore: In Jerry Bridges' book, The Gospel for Real Life, he says we put the gospel on a shelf.
Anna Moore: We relegate the gospel to a shelf, and then we pull it down when we need it for a lost person.
Anna Moore: Oh, you're having some company over and you know that you need to share the gospel around the dinner table, you pull it down.
Anna Moore: You're going out on, you know, evangelism with your church.
Anna Moore: Let me get the gospel off the shelf and take it with me.
Anna Moore: Ladies, we don't need to relegate the gospel just for the to the shelf, just for non-believers.
Anna Moore: We need it to be the driving force behind everything we do as Christians.
Anna Moore: So we must hold it close.
Anna Moore: We must keep it in front of us.
Anna Moore: We must use the gospel as our motivation.
Anna Moore: Again, I didn't learn that until many years into my Christian walk.
Anna Moore: So just like I always want to make the gospel clear for unbelievers, I also want to encourage you believers with the gospel as well.
Anna Moore: Those believers in Colossae, they, he says to them, it came to you, it came to you.
Anna Moore: The gospel came to you, came to the whole world, bearing fruit, increasing, as it also does among you, still does among you.
Anna Moore: They're still walking in that same gospel.
Anna Moore: They were saved by it and they're walking in it.
Anna Moore: I don't want you to miss it like I did.
Anna Moore: So here's what I mean, and here's a way to apply it right now.
Anna Moore: Here's how you look for it in scripture.
Anna Moore: Where do you see the gospel in relation to us living out various arenas of our Christian walk?
Anna Moore: How do we tie hospitality to the gospel?
Anna Moore: And that is found in Ephesians 2, verses 12 and 13, and verse 19.
Anna Moore: Ephesians 2.
Anna Moore: Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
Anna Moore: But now in Christ Jesus, you who were once far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.
Anna Moore: So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.
Anna Moore: What is that, ladies?
Anna Moore: The greatest hospitality that was ever shown.
Anna Moore: Bringing us as from strangers and aliens to be members of the household of God.
Anna Moore: If you are born again, if you are saved, if you are a child of God, you should be practicing hospitality because of the gospel, because the blood of Christ has brought us near.
Anna Moore: Jesus Himself used homes to teach and preach, as did the disciples in the early church.
Anna Moore: We see it throughout Scripture.
Anna Moore: We're just going to look at one scripture here, Acts 5, 42.
Anna Moore: And every day in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that the Christ is Jesus.
Anna Moore: And we see in John, 3rd John, that the believers are housing and being hospitable to those who are workers in the kingdom of God.
Anna Moore: 3 John verses 7 and 8, for they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles.
Anna Moore: Therefore we ought to support people like these that we may be fellow workers for the truth.
Anna Moore: Now we're going to talk more about practical ways we can use our homes and use our hospitality for the sake of the gospel later on.
Anna Moore: But now I want to move on to Roman numeral 2, which is biblical examples of hospitality.
Anna Moore: Let's go to the Old Testament, 2 Kings 4, 8 through 10.
Anna Moore: And remember the Shunammite woman.
Anna Moore: What did she do?
Anna Moore: Built a room for Elisha.
Anna Moore: One day Elisha went on to Shunam, where a wealthy woman lived, who urged him to eat some food.
Anna Moore: So whenever he passed that way, he would turn in there to eat food.
Anna Moore: And she said to her husband, Behold, now I know that this is a holy man of God who is continually passing our way.
Anna Moore: Let's make a small room on the roof with walls and put there for him a bed, a table, a chair, a lamp, so that whenever he comes to us, he can go in there.
Anna Moore: Let's just let's just build Elisha his own little suite.
Anna Moore: That's what we're gonna do.
Anna Moore: That's hospitality.
Anna Moore: That's really sweet.
Anna Moore: Mary, Martha, and Lazarus.
Anna Moore: I'm not gonna read these, but in Luke 10 you find it, Luke, John 12, other places, they were close friends of Jesus.
Anna Moore: They often fed and and loved practically Jesus and the disciples.
Anna Moore: They showed great hospitality to them.
Anna Moore: Simon the Tanner, we read about in Acts 9:43.
Anna Moore: He housed Peter in Joppa for many days.
Anna Moore: And then we get to Acts chapter 16 with so many examples.
Anna Moore: Think about Lydia, Acts 16, verses 14 and 15.
Anna Moore: One who heard us was a woman named Lydia from the city of Thyatira, a seller of purple goods, who was a worshiper of God.
Anna Moore: The Lord opened her heart to pay attention to what was said by Paul.
Anna Moore: There's that heart change, right?
Anna Moore: The Lord opened her heart.
Anna Moore: And after she was baptized and her household as well, she urged us, saying, If you have judged me to be faithful to the Lord, come to my house and stay.
Anna Moore: And she prevailed upon us.
Anna Moore: God opened Lydia's heart and she opened her home.
Anna Moore: That was the first thing she did after she had her heart of stone removed and changed to a heart of flesh.
Anna Moore: And this verse is why my lesson is named the hospitable heart.
Anna Moore: I just love this.
Anna Moore: In that same chapter, you see the Philippian jailer in Acts 16, 32 through 34.
Anna Moore: And they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to all who were in his house.
Anna Moore: And he took them the same hour of the night and washed their wounds, and he was baptized at once, he and all his family.
Anna Moore: Then he brought them where?
Anna Moore: Up into his house, and he set food before them, and he rejoiced along with his entire household that he had believed in God.
Anna Moore: He could have just as easily said, Wow, thank you, thank you, thank you, washed their wounds, bandaged.
Anna Moore: That's that's hospitable, that's kind, but sent them on their way.
Anna Moore: You you're free from prison now.
Anna Moore: Uh God has done a great miracle here.
Anna Moore: Thank you so much.
Anna Moore: Here's a band-aid, and hope to see you again.
Anna Moore: But that's not what he did.
Anna Moore: He bandaged their wounds and then he brought them to his house.
Anna Moore: And Gaius in Romans chapter 16, 23.
Anna Moore: Paul is talking about this man, Gaius, who's a host to me and to the whole church, greets you.
Anna Moore: Erastus, the city treasurer, and our brother Quartus, Quartus greets you.
Anna Moore: Gaius, who is a host to me.
Anna Moore: Hospitality shown to Paul.
Anna Moore: 3 John 5 and 6, back to 3 John.
Anna Moore: Beloved, it's a faithful thing you do in all your efforts for these brothers, strangers as they are, who testified to your love before the church, you will do well to send them on their journey in a manner worthy of God.
Anna Moore: Going back to their home church, saying, I gotta tell you about these faithful brothers.
Anna Moore: They're being very hospitable and kind to us, they have cared well for us.
Anna Moore: There's a negative example.
Anna Moore: I'm not sure if this is gonna be on the screen.
Anna Moore: I'm sorry, I can't remember, but of Simon the Pharisee in Luke 7, and I'll read 44 through 46.
Anna Moore: Then turning toward the woman, there it is, he said to Simon, let me just say this, first of all, let me explain this.
Anna Moore: Simon the Pharisee is having a big throwing a big old bash, like a dinner party, big bash, and he's invited Jesus.
Anna Moore: And then a sinful woman from the town comes in, and uh this is what Jesus says about what she did and about what Simon did.
Anna Moore: Jesus says, then turning toward the woman, he said to Simon, Do you see this woman?
Anna Moore: I entered your house and you gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair.
Anna Moore: You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in, she has not to cease kissing my feet.
Anna Moore: You did not anoint my head with oil, but she has anointed my feet with ointment.
Anna Moore: And then Jesus goes on to say, She has been forgiven.
Anna Moore: She has loved much, and she has been forgiven much.
Anna Moore: Simon, you are a pathetic example of hospitality.
Anna Moore: You don't get it, but this woman has been very hospitable to me.
Anna Moore: Simon was simply entertaining, Simon was not welcoming, Simon was not polite, the woman was.
Anna Moore: She showed great love to Jesus.
Anna Moore: Now, let's look at what the Bible says to us about hospitality.
Anna Moore: And this is where you're like, this is all well and good.
Anna Moore: This is great.
Anna Moore: I love these biblical examples of hospitality.
Anna Moore: But guess what else the Bible tells us?
Anna Moore: Many times we have commands about hospitality.
Anna Moore: So this is where the rubber meets the road.
Anna Moore: Romans 12, 13.
Anna Moore: Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
Anna Moore: Be looking for ways to do it, is what Paul is saying to the Romans, and we are seeing for ourselves here.
Anna Moore: Don't wait till it comes to you, but seek to show hospitality.
Anna Moore: And then 1 Peter 4 and 9, show hospitality to one another without grumbling.
Anna Moore: Ladies, the verse does not stop with show hospitality to one another.
Anna Moore: That's a command, and it's there.
Anna Moore: But you know the last part of the command, without grumbling.
Anna Moore: I always say that I need this particular verse engraved on the inside of my glasses so I can just see it all the time, or post it on every mirror, every closet door in my home as I'm changing sheets, like a hotel room, you know, cleaner does.
Anna Moore: I mean, it's just, it's like I need to see that verse and remind myself of that verse all the time.
Anna Moore: But you know what I know?
Anna Moore: I'm probably not the only one that needs it because Peter would not have written it under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit if it was not needed.
Anna Moore: He knows it's easy for us to grumble, and he says, be hospitable without grumbling.
Anna Moore: Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.
Anna Moore: Hebrews 13, too, do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.
Anna Moore: Now, we're not thankfully doing a conference on angels because I don't have to now talk about this.
Anna Moore: I don't know if this is actual angels.
Anna Moore: That's up for debate.
Anna Moore: But I will say that I think of this verse a lot when someone new pops up, someone just pops into my door that I don't know.
Anna Moore: And sometimes you just think, Lord, are you are you testing me on this?
Anna Moore: But whatever the case, I think the point, and I'm that I believe the point is the first part of that verse.
Anna Moore: Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.
Anna Moore: In those days, there were not hotels or Airbnbs.
Anna Moore: Christians had to show hospitality to each other and to others, even if they did not know them.
Anna Moore: That was the what they had to do, just like when the Shunammite woman said, Oh, let me just build a room for him.
Anna Moore: She had the money to do that.
Anna Moore: But they would make room and they would crowd into homes and they would be hospitable to each other even if they didn't know them, because they're traveling hard, long distances.
Anna Moore: And you just you just did that.
Anna Moore: I want to share with you now, could have done it later, but I think this is a good spot to share some of my struggles and how easy it can be for me to grumble after we've just talked about this verse.
Anna Moore: First of all, I want to say we do a lot of hospitality.
Anna Moore: Now I'm not bragging.
Anna Moore: You say you didn't listen to your you didn't listen to your talk on taming the tongue, so you're showing your very proud heart.
Anna Moore: No, I'm not saying in a proud way.
Anna Moore: Matter of fact, we do a lot of hospitality in our house.
Anna Moore: Our house has a revolving door on it.
Anna Moore: We love doing it.
Anna Moore: Lots of people are in and out.
Anna Moore: Some are planned, some are unplanned.
Anna Moore: And we do love it most of the time.
Anna Moore: You see, with hospitality, it's all fun and games until stuff breaks, or people won't leave so you can go to bed, or they don't help you clean up the kitchen, or they show up with no warning.
Anna Moore: It's all great till that happens.
Anna Moore: I remember years ago, we went through just a little spell in our marriage where after church, a few times, you know, within a few months period, all of a sudden I'd be, we have two services, and I would usually go to the early service, maybe get the kids home or whatever.
Anna Moore: And I would be kind of fumbling around, like, I don't know what we're gonna eat for lunch today, whatever, you know.
Anna Moore: And the doorbell would ring about 12:40, 1245 after the second service would have been over.
Anna Moore: And there are these nicely dressed people from church that I didn't know, or they're new people to the church.
Anna Moore: They say, Hey, I say, Well, hello.
Anna Moore: Hey, yeah, Ed told us to come over and have lunch.
Anna Moore: He'll be here after he finishes greeting everybody on the lawn.
Anna Moore: Well, he did that to me a few times, and then very nicely, I don't think it's wrong.
Anna Moore: It not wasn't grumbling.
Anna Moore: I just kind of had to nicely say to him, do not ever do that to me again.
Anna Moore: Please give me warning.
Anna Moore: Give me, just shoot me a text at least, something.
Anna Moore: Give me some warning.
Anna Moore: But that's what I mean, ladies.
Anna Moore: Are we prepared for these things?
Anna Moore: But that's a real reason to grumble, let me tell you.
Anna Moore: We got that worked out, don't worry.
Anna Moore: So he's he's very good about not doing that anymore.
Anna Moore: But there's the grape juice and the cranberry juice and the red Kool-Aid that's all over your white carpet.
Anna Moore: And why anyone would have white carpet, I do not know, but we did.
Anna Moore: We picked it when we first moved to New York of all places, living on the Clearview Expressway with the soot and the dirt.
Anna Moore: And we chose white carpet.
Anna Moore: So, ladies, get vinyl, get hardwood, get something.
Anna Moore: Don't get white carpet.
Anna Moore: But when that juice spills on there, there's nothing you can do about that.
Anna Moore: When there are pen marks on your sheets and your tablecloth that won't come out in the wash, when there's a broken rocker leg on your family, heirloom, ants, rocking chair.
Anna Moore: These are all real things if you couldn't tell by now, okay.
Anna Moore: Now I want to show you a couple of photos, so we'll go one at a time.
Anna Moore: So we've got some.
Anna Moore: I just I thought you needed to see these things.
Anna Moore: This is on my end table at home, the first end table I see when I walk into my living room area.
Anna Moore: And it's a constant reminder to me that someone I was hospitable to doesn't have any more sense than to put a wet cup on a on a wood.
Anna Moore: So if you don't know that, ladies, please do not ever put a cup that will sweat onto real wood.
Anna Moore: And the the ironic thing is now those fall coasters weren't there, but there are always three or four coasters sitting on that thing.
Anna Moore: But no, this person chose to put it on the wood, it's been there for years.
Anna Moore: But you know what it is?
Anna Moore: It's a reminder to me that I gotta get over it and it's okay.
Anna Moore: And so I could just find a nice doily and cover it up, but I don't because I want to remind myself that I can't grumble and be hospitable.
Anna Moore: Next one.
Anna Moore: Oh, yeah.
Anna Moore: This happened, this happened this summer.
Anna Moore: If you knew our interns this summer, they were delightful, but somehow the girls decided to have a slumber party in my basement, and this is what transpired.
Anna Moore: The bed broke.
Anna Moore: So, and then God bless them.
Anna Moore: Although we asked them to, I don't think they knew quite how to fix it.
Anna Moore: So, Ed and I, the way we fix everything, we duct taped that back together.
Anna Moore: It works now, and next picture, when you come to my house, you will never ever know because that's what it looks like.
Anna Moore: So you can just yet no company, and it's on the side of the wall.
Anna Moore: Nobody's ever gonna know.
Anna Moore: But I know that it's broken, but I can't grumble.
Anna Moore: All right.
Anna Moore: The next one's wait, just one second.
Anna Moore: So is anybody a dishwasher snob?
Anna Moore: If you have a dishwasher, raise your hand, hi, be proud.
Anna Moore: Do you know what I mean?
Anna Moore: Some of you are like, I wish I had a dishwasher.
Anna Moore: Some of you throw your dishes in.
Anna Moore: I am a dishwasher snob.
Anna Moore: My kids would say, Why should we help you with this when you're going to rearrange every single thing in it?
Anna Moore: So you will approach, thank you.
Anna Moore: Yes, she says, Amen.
Anna Moore: I'm with you, sister.
Anna Moore: Yes.
Anna Moore: So uh 20, I don't know, three years ago.
Anna Moore: Sorry, 2023, not 23 years ago.
Anna Moore: Now you can look back and see who our interns were that year.
Anna Moore: But the sweet girls that lived at our house, they would load the dishwasher.
Anna Moore: So the next three pictures are just, I just was absolutely go dogs.
Anna Moore: You see my Georgia cup right there.
Anna Moore: But the thing about those Georgia cups, if you can tell, they're two together and they're laying sideways.
Anna Moore: And I sent these to my son, my daughter and son-in-law, because he's very meticulous.
Anna Moore: And I just thought, you're the only people that I know will appreciate this, but I've kept them forever because next one.
Anna Moore: Okay, I know this is all kind of the foods.
Anna Moore: Not only, not only how are those gonna get clean, how did they get them to stay like that?
Anna Moore: Okay, next one.
Anna Moore: Just the just the whatever is down there, just everything, just whatever is down there.
Anna Moore: I I I you know, I I know that it's comical, but I really need you to know that those are the kinds of things that make me grumble when I'm showing hospitality.
Anna Moore: But I shouldn't.
Anna Moore: I should be thankful that those girls loaded my dishwasher and didn't leave all of those dishes in the sink for me.
Anna Moore: I should be thankful that I have a dishwasher that did them.
Anna Moore: So I take pictures and I try to remind myself, and I keep the duct tape on the bed and don't buy a new one because number one, I can't afford it.
Anna Moore: But number two, I'd want to be reminded that it's okay.
Anna Moore: It works still, and that's part of hospitality, is stuff is gonna break.
Anna Moore: Um, now, my all-time favorite thing.
Anna Moore: So, you know, you've read, I'm I'm sure a lot of you, I heard one of you m mention it.
Anna Moore: You may have read the Rosario Butterfield book, uh, The Gospel Comes with a House Key.
Anna Moore: And I read that and I thought, I'm hospitable, but boy, she is taking it next level.
Anna Moore: I mean, it is, it's like, yeah, way, way past me.
Anna Moore: The one thing that was a really stretch for us is one year, my uh I am 20, I don't know, 16, 17, 18, somewhere in there, my son who lives in Georgia called and said, Hey, mom and dad, this really sweet couple that I knew at Georgia, I went to school with, they're going to be missionaries and they're moving for, you know, they're moving, I don't know, for months to go to this some country.
Anna Moore: And their plane just got canceled or delayed at JFK.
Anna Moore: Now you all know living in, you get a lot of calls like that, living in New York, I would assume.
Anna Moore: You know, people get stranded, and that that's understandable.
Anna Moore: And they said, Can you fit them in?
Anna Moore: Yeah, we've got a few people here, but we'll fit them in, no problem.
Anna Moore: Well, it's just, yeah, they're they're well, actually, yeah, that's great.
Anna Moore: If you can, fine.
Anna Moore: They'll get an Uber.
Anna Moore: Great.
Anna Moore: Okay.
Anna Moore: Well, we get another call just a few minutes later, and it's our son again, and he goes, I made a really big mistake.
Anna Moore: I didn't realize these people have a dog and they have the dog with them.
Anna Moore: And you may say, So?
Anna Moore: Well, so we have never had an inside pet, nor would we ever allow one.
Anna Moore: We had outside dogs when we lived in South Carolina, but dogs in our house?
Anna Moore: Absolutely not.
Anna Moore: And we just, my husband looked at me and we were giving him on the speakerphone and we're like, uh, he goes, Yeah, I'm sorry about that.
Anna Moore: He said, but I do need an answer because they're sitting outside your house in the Uber right now.
Anna Moore: And I said, Okay.
Anna Moore: What to do?
Anna Moore: So the couple and their very sweet dog came in our house, and there they are.
Anna Moore: That's you can tell I'm much younger than, so it was a long time ago.
Anna Moore: But this, it was such a treat.
Anna Moore: They kept the dog in their room.
Anna Moore: The dog didn't tear anything up, but it stretched us.
Anna Moore: And and there actually has been another dog, and I can't remember exactly when it was, but it's like the Lord was testing us, thinking, You think you're good at this?
Anna Moore: You think you've got this down?
Anna Moore: I'm gonna show you that you don't, and I'm gonna test you in a way that you are so uncomfortable.
Anna Moore: And so these dear people stayed with their dog.
Anna Moore: They were able to catch the flight the next day.
Anna Moore: Thank you for indulging me with those photos.
Anna Moore: I just wanted you to see real life as it happens with hospitality.
Anna Moore: And that's okay, because we as Christians with new hearts, with soft hearts, with hearts of flesh, with changed hearts, must show hospitality without grumbling.
Anna Moore: First Timothy 3, 1 and 2 says, This saying is trustworthy.
Anna Moore: If anyone aspires to the office of overseer, he desires a noble task.
Anna Moore: Therefore, an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectful, hospitable, able to teach.
Anna Moore: Now, remember what we're doing.
Anna Moore: We're going through scriptures that list hospitality commands.
Anna Moore: And this is the, these are the qualifications for an elder or a pastor.
Anna Moore: And so I understand that none of us in here fit that, but some of you may be married to an elder or a pastor.
Anna Moore: And so I want to say, especially to you, yes, it's a qualification for your husband, but by the fact that you now, the two have become one flesh, this is also for you.
Anna Moore: So you need to be hospitable in your homes and with your husband in his ministry.
Anna Moore: I met a pastor's wife on vacation one year.
Anna Moore: We were they were vacationing at the same spot we were many years ago.
Anna Moore: And I I we just were chatting, and I don't even know why we came onto this, you know, topic, but she said, Oh, yeah, we used to live near the church, or maybe in a parsonage near the church.
Anna Moore: I don't know.
Anna Moore: She said, but we've moved several miles out, and it has been the most wonderful thing.
Anna Moore: We go home at night and we close all the blinds and we turn our phones off and we just seclude ourselves.
Anna Moore: I mean, she just went on and on.
Anna Moore: And I'm thinking, lady, you and your husband are in the wrong profession because the Bible says you need to be bent toward hospitality.
Anna Moore: Now, please do not hear me saying that we should never have family time.
Anna Moore: I am not saying that you have to volunteer your house for everyone, and this goes for all of you, not just pastors' wives in here, to volunteer to house everyone or host everything.
Anna Moore: I'm not saying that, but I am saying, ladies, the bent of our lives should be toward showing.
Anna Moore: We should be leaning in to hospitality and not pulling back from it and not shutting our blinds figuratively or literally.
Anna Moore: Romans 16, 1 and 2.
Anna Moore: I commend to you, Phoebe, our sister, who is a servant of the church in Centria, that you may receive her in the Lord in a manner worthy of the saints and assist her in whatever business she has need of you.
Anna Moore: For indeed she has been a helper of many and of myself also.
Anna Moore: Paul was great about this.
Anna Moore: He would commend people like back then, he would send a letter, and you would have to get that letter to know somebody was coming if you're going to get any warning at all that they were visiting.
Anna Moore: And he's sending this to the Romans saying, I commend Phoebe to you.
Anna Moore: She is a servant of the church.
Anna Moore: I want you to receive her in a manner, I want you to be hospitable to her in a manner that is worthy of the saints.
Anna Moore: Luke 14, 12 through 14, he also said to the man who had invited him, When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends.
Anna Moore: Friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid.
Anna Moore: But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.
Anna Moore: Don't ever be guilty of saying things like, Well, they never had us over.
Anna Moore: Well, I'm done having them over.
Anna Moore: I I've had her over for coffee three times, and she's never invited me into her house.
Anna Moore: Don't do it to be reciprocated or repaid.
Anna Moore: That's why we must remain gospel focused.
Anna Moore: Ladies, we can never outgive God.
Anna Moore: We're giving nothing back to him.
Anna Moore: I mean, we hope we serve him well.
Anna Moore: We are due, we did nothing to get in his good graces.
Anna Moore: It was his grace alone.
Anna Moore: So let's remember that we are not trying to outgive God and could never if we if we tried.
Anna Moore: And we do not need to be reciprocated in our hospitality.
Anna Moore: Now, number four, practicing hospitality.
Anna Moore: A reminder to you of those pictures.
Anna Moore: Those, your home and your stuff is not really yours.
Anna Moore: It belongs to the Lord.
Anna Moore: He's the one that gave it to you.
Anna Moore: He's the one that gave you the strength to work for the money to buy the stuff.
Anna Moore: It's not yours.
Anna Moore: You're not taking it with you.
Anna Moore: You need to hold on loosely to stuff.
Anna Moore: Our culture's mentality is that our lives and our homes are private, and we must live counter to our culture as Christians.
Anna Moore: Now, I'm not suggesting that we all move in a commune and share everything, but the Christian life and walk is personal for sure, but it's not private.
Anna Moore: And there's a big difference.
Anna Moore: The Christian life and walk is personal, not private.
Anna Moore: So don't buy into the lies of our society.
Anna Moore: We must be willing to open our hearts and our homes and our lives to others.
Anna Moore: I want to tell you the background in my own life, why Ed and I love hospitality so much, other than the gospel motivating us, it was modeled in front of us, and we have been the recipients of it.
Anna Moore: Our parents both showed it when we were growing up.
Anna Moore: Also, uh the first year uh that Ed was working a church job out of college, we were not yet married.
Anna Moore: And um, for one year, these two families in the church, six months and six months, let Ed live in their homes for free, in their basement, in their spare room, and showed great hospitality to him.
Anna Moore: So we've seen it modeled.
Anna Moore: How do we do it?
Anna Moore: Where do we do it?
Anna Moore: When do you do it?
Anna Moore: So you may be sitting here saying, Look, I don't even have a home.
Anna Moore: I live in New York City, I rent a room, or I live in a studio, or I still live with my parents, or we live with our in-laws.
Anna Moore: There's a lot of scenarios where you don't have your own private space to do this, and I understand that.
Anna Moore: But there are creative ways.
Anna Moore: You don't have to have your own home to do this.
Anna Moore: We had a gentleman named Wally in our church many years ago.
Anna Moore: He's retired from the postal service, went on to be a missionary in Jamaica.
Anna Moore: He went up and lived in Massachusetts and was involved in a church there.
Anna Moore: But when Wally was at North Shore, he lived in like a basement room someplace, and he wanted to be hospitable.
Anna Moore: And so, you know what he would do?
Anna Moore: He would just take the people to the diners.
Anna Moore: He would just say, Okay, we're gonna meet at the diner.
Anna Moore: I can't have you in my home, but I'm gonna meet you at the diner.
Anna Moore: So we started calling him Wally the Diner Guy.
Anna Moore: I mean, that was his nickname.
Anna Moore: You can be the diner lady, you can be the Starbucks lady, you can be whatever.
Anna Moore: But think of creative ways to show hospitality to people.
Anna Moore: How about meal trains or whatever you call them at your church, the meal ministry?
Anna Moore: For the church to take meals during a time of uh suffering or joy, a new baby or surgery or a death in the family, whatever it is, for a church to show up with meals at the door is a huge act of hospitality.
Anna Moore: And you know what else it does?
Anna Moore: For those unsaved family members, I've seen that over the years.
Anna Moore: They have been so impressed by that as unsaved spouses or children open the doors to accept those meals.
Anna Moore: It is a great testimony to them of the love of Christ.
Anna Moore: So, meal ministries get involved in that.
Anna Moore: Meet other ladies for coffee or tea to study the word together or just to say, hey, what's going on in your life and how can I pray for you?
Anna Moore: The holidays are coming up.
Anna Moore: I was searching for my college football channels on the XM radio on the way, driving here this morning, and happened to turn over one and it said holiday already.
Anna Moore: And I thought, what is this, November 15th?
Anna Moore: And we've already started the Christmas music, which makes me happy.
Anna Moore: I left that station on so it would bother my husband because he thinks that you know December 24th, you start playing the Christmas music.
Anna Moore: So I'm gonna let him get in that car and turn it up really loud and be shocked.
Anna Moore: But it just was a great reminder to me that the holidays are around the corner.
Anna Moore: What about Thanksgiving and Christmas?
Anna Moore: You say, well, you know, I've got a big family here in New York.
Anna Moore: We always just do our own thing.
Anna Moore: And it's just we it wouldn't be appropriate to ask other people.
Anna Moore: You may have unsaved uh parents or spouse you live with, and it's not appropriate.
Anna Moore: But, ladies, I would say if you are Christians, I would say invite if you're both Christians and you can do this.
Anna Moore: There's no reason you should not be inviting someone in your home that's not a family member for the holidays.
Anna Moore: It's a perfect way to show hospitality.
Anna Moore: We love in our church finding people that do not have family close and inviting them for Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter.
Anna Moore: You know why?
Anna Moore: We don't have any family close.
Anna Moore: So our church is our family.
Anna Moore: So invite people, invite people maybe that come from different countries whose custom it is not to celebrate Thanksgiving and say, hey, come join us for fellowship on Thanksgiving Day.
Anna Moore: We have had so many wonderful meals around our table for holidays.
Anna Moore: Include them in your festivities.
Anna Moore: Maybe there's a meal over which you're gonna share the gospel and you just invite, you know, a newcomer to your church and say, I want you to know what we believe.
Anna Moore: Come over to my house and I'm gonna share from the Bible with you.
Anna Moore: Host a Bible study or a small group at your house.
Anna Moore: Have just a dessert fellowship.
Anna Moore: Get those recipes or just hire those women who made those tiny desserts and ask them to make it for your dessert fellowship.
Anna Moore: You would be, you'd have to like lock the door.
Anna Moore: Everybody would want to be coming to that dessert fellowship.
Anna Moore: Come up with recipes you can trust.
Anna Moore: Remember, we're we're talking about how do we do hospitality.
Anna Moore: We're getting really practical here.
Anna Moore: Ladies, you know the rule.
Anna Moore: Do not ever, ever, ever, ever try out a new recipe on company because it will 100 times out of 100 fail.
Anna Moore: Use the tried and true.
Anna Moore: It doesn't matter.
Anna Moore: You know, my husband and I are sick of this one or two, these one or two dishes that I do for all the company.
Anna Moore: It's okay because it works.
Anna Moore: Just do what you know and trust.
Anna Moore: Do the simple, do the inexpensive, grill out, make sandwiches.
Anna Moore: Crockpot is my very best friend in my kitchen.
Anna Moore: Use it.
Anna Moore: It it is so helpful.
Anna Moore: Be budget conscious.
Anna Moore: Buy reduced meat when it's you know on sale and freeze it.
Anna Moore: Now let's look at the benefits to other people.
Anna Moore: Those receiving your hospitality.
Anna Moore: What are some of them?
Anna Moore: Just call them out.
Anna Moore: What are benefits to people receiving your hospitality?
Anna Moore: A cooked meal.
Anna Moore: Absolutely.
Anna Moore: Feeling loved.
Anna Moore: Remember my broken bed?
Anna Moore: Place to lay their head.
Anna Moore: You can meet those physical needs, and you can meet the spiritual needs.
Anna Moore: Feeling loved, hearing the gospel, experiencing the love of Christ, seeing a family operate, a godly family operate as a godly family.
Anna Moore: And I want to tell you the benefits to us, to our family personally, the joy it has brought us.
Anna Moore: Many missionaries have come through and stayed in our house.
Anna Moore: For our children to have the privilege of hearing those stories and to meet these very special people has been such a blessing over the years.
Anna Moore: We have our intern program, as I mentioned.
Anna Moore: And every year for 20 years, we've had four or five college-age interns living in our house every summer.
Anna Moore: And other people in our church do it as well.
Anna Moore: And they they have to house them.
Anna Moore: We'll have, you know, a dozen or 15 interns.
Anna Moore: So a lot of homes have to be used for that.
Anna Moore: And we've had godly college-aged men and women living in our house, working in our church, and they've been wonderful role models for our children, great examples.
Anna Moore: And quite frankly, not every one of them were as good.
Anna Moore: But they served a great purpose as well because our children saw the drastic difference in work ethic, in their attitudes, and their demeanors and demeanors and their passion for the Lord.
Anna Moore: They have been great help to us.
Anna Moore: It was a great teaching tool dropped in our laps as parents.
Anna Moore: You live with somebody three months, you're pretty much gonna see it all.
Anna Moore: And here it is, all laid out there.
Anna Moore: Plus, we got two lovely daughters-in-law out of it and a son-in-law out of it, the intern program.
Anna Moore: So we kind of like it.
Anna Moore: But you know what one of my greatest joys is?
Anna Moore: It's to see my children carrying on hospitality and doing it in their homes.
Anna Moore: I had a fear, you know, when I don't know, a lot of you in here have adult children, and they don't ever, you know, mind.
Anna Moore: They that our children are great.
Anna Moore: They love us very much, but they now they're out of the house, they're safe to say this.
Anna Moore: They can tell us the things that we did wrong as parents, and they can they can say things, you know, when they were getting married and they would say, you know, we're not gonna do this like you guys did, mom and dad.
Anna Moore: We just want you to know that.
Anna Moore: That's okay.
Anna Moore: You're your own family.
Anna Moore: You you do what the Lord wants you to do.
Anna Moore: Yeah, we're not gonna do this, mom and dad, you know.
Anna Moore: And and I begin to have this fear that they had been exposed to so much, you know, so many people in their home all their lives, and so much hospitality that they were not going to do that.
Anna Moore: They were going to kind of rebel, if you will, against that and just be turned against it.
Anna Moore: And praise God, it was quite the contrary.
Anna Moore: As soon as they moved away, even in college before they were married, they were showing hospitality.
Anna Moore: When they got apartments, they were showing hospitality.
Anna Moore: My daughter will cook a crock pot of chicken chili, and she will just go down the church roll and say, I just want to do people I don't know well, and she'll have these people one week and next month she'll do these people.
Anna Moore: And I have watched them be so kind and hospitable.
Anna Moore: And that, other than their salvation, that is the greatest joy for me as a mom to see that they understand the hospitality commands of scripture.
Anna Moore: But, ladies, ultimately, all that we do, we do it unto Christ.
Anna Moore: One last portion of Scripture, Matthew 25, 34 through 36, and then verse 40.
Anna Moore: Then the king will say to those on his right, Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.
Anna Moore: For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink.
Anna Moore: I was a stranger and you welcomed me.
Anna Moore: I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.
Anna Moore: And the king will answer them, Truly I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these, my brothers, you did it to me.
Anna Moore: Ladies, ultimately, we're doing it for the glory of God.
Anna Moore: So the question is simple Are you practicing hospitality without grumbling?
Anna Moore: If you aren't, then take your reasons, take your excuses, and work through them, work around them, and figure out a way to do it to the glory of God.
Anna Moore: And if you are, ladies, keep it up.
Anna Moore: Praise God.
Anna Moore: I encourage you, always be striving to improve and do more.
Anna Moore: Ladies, a soft heart, a changed heart, a heart of flesh is one that does when it hears.
Anna Moore: And I challenge you this day to be doers of the word, and not only in this one area of hospitality, but to be obedient in all.
Anna Moore: And why?
Anna Moore: What's of first importance?
Anna Moore: The gospel.
Anna Moore: Never lose sight of that.
Anna Moore: We were strangers and aliens, enemies of God in our sin, and he brought us near by the blood of Christ.
Anna Moore: He made us alive, he made us his family, he has delivered us from darkness to light, from death to life.
Anna Moore: Praise him, serve him, obey him.
Anna Moore: It's been a great privilege to be with you.
Anna Moore: Thank you for being attentive, for hanging in there, for uh being so uh just so kind yourselves.
Anna Moore: And I appreciate all of you being here this weekend.
Anna Moore: So let's close in prayer and then we'll get further instruction.
Anna Moore: Is that right?
Anna Moore: Okay, Father, thank you again for these dear ladies.
Anna Moore: Oh Lord, let us never lose sight of the hospitality that has been shown to us, God, uh, for myself, as I am so, so uh tempted and and to grumble and grumble so easily.
Anna Moore: Lord, help me forgive me.
Anna Moore: I pray, Lord, that we would serve you in all areas with gladness, that we would have hearts that are soft and pliable and teachable.
Anna Moore: And I pray, God, that you would be pleased to save someone as a result of this conference.
Anna Moore: Lord, the word they have heard.
Anna Moore: I pray you would penetrate their heart, pray you would convict them of their sin and show them their great need for a savior.
Anna Moore: Lord, bless us now as we go into our group time.
Anna Moore: I pray it would be beneficial as we open up and share with others.
Anna Moore: And Lord, uh thank you.
Anna Moore: Thank you for saving us.
Anna Moore: Thank you for the gospel in Jesus' name.
Anna Moore: Amen.