Speaker 1: The following message is from Faith Presbyterian Church in Birmingham, Alabama.
Speaker 1: Join us on Sundays for our 8, 15, and 11 am worship services.
Speaker 1: For more information, visit us online at faith-pcaorg or download the Faith PCA app.
Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in to Faith's podcast ministry.
Speaker 2: If you have a copy of God's Word, turn with me to Romans.
Speaker 2: So go to the New Testament, romans, chapter 12.
Speaker 2: If you have a Bible, keep it open.
Speaker 2: We're going to be referring.
Speaker 2: We're going to look at one verse actually, but we'll refer.
Speaker 2: I'll point back to some of the context of the chapter as we move along.
Speaker 2: This morning, this fall, starting after Labor Day, we're going to study the Old Testament book.
Speaker 2: Remember, we are a church.
Speaker 2: We march through books of the Bible.
Speaker 2: We try to have a healthy dose of all of Scripture because we believe all of Scripture is breathed out by God, and so we do.
Speaker 2: New Testament, old Testament.
Speaker 2: We're going to the Old Testament and doing this fall, the Old Testament, book of Daniel.
Speaker 2: We'll start that after Labor Day.
Speaker 2: But you know, every now and then I like to pause and remind us of who we are.
Speaker 2: I like to pause and refocus us on who God has called us to be as the church.
Speaker 2: I think that it's vitally important that we continue to do that.
Speaker 2: Why?
Speaker 2: Well, it's simple.
Speaker 2: You've heard the old saying if you aim at nothing, what You'll hit it every time.
Speaker 2: That's true of organizations and businesses.
Speaker 2: If you're a business owner, it's also true of the church.
Speaker 2: It's really easy for the church to get off course.
Speaker 2: It's really easy for the church to forget why we exist and to be distracted by so many things often good things and so we got to keep coming back to our vision.
Speaker 2: We got to keep coming back to things that are important to us and to our values, because they help us stay the course.
Speaker 2: How do you stay the course?
Speaker 2: You have to name your values, you have to name the things that are important to you, and that's what we want to do this morning.
Speaker 2: This summer I obviously had a lot of time to read and this was unintentional, but one of the threads through all of my reading could be summarized in one word Hospitality.
Speaker 2: Our church, as you've seen this morning we saw it in the early service we're in a rapid season of growth.
Speaker 2: We're in the middle of our All Generations building program to finish out the property.
Speaker 2: We received 90 new members this morning and as we grow, we want this place to still feel small.
Speaker 2: As we grow, we want our church to feel small and in order for that to happen, we've got to stay focused on deepening our community and specifically practicing hospitality.
Speaker 2: Many of you know I sent my oldest to college last weekend, dropped her off.
Speaker 2: By the way, that was way harder than I thought it was going to be.
Speaker 2: I thought I got this.
Speaker 2: I didn't have it, by the way, but the night before we had a little final dinner as our family and I'd asked the girls to share anything.
Speaker 2: But I specifically asked Kate, my oldest, to talk about going to college and this, that and any parting words kind of thing.
Speaker 2: And she, of course, reflected back, was reflecting back on her life and God's goodness to her and talking about her friends and all sorts of things.
Speaker 2: But towards the end she said I also am really going to miss our church.
Speaker 2: And I said why?
Speaker 2: And it wasn't because of the preaching, it wasn't because of all the great things that she had learned, though she's learned so many and all those things are important.
Speaker 2: You know what she said.
Speaker 2: She said I feel loved there, I feel at home there, I feel like I belong.
Speaker 2: Side note, side note do you know how big a deal that is for a pk, a pastor's kid, to love the church and to say that that meant the world to me?
Speaker 2: And you know why she said it?
Speaker 2: Because of you, because the ways you have loved her and the ways that you love other people in her church.
Speaker 2: You see, hospitality provides the fertile soil for theology and gospel and Bible and all the things we talk about to take root, and I hear stories like that all the time.
Speaker 2: That's the thing I hear most about.
Speaker 2: Our church is warm, hospitable and welcoming.
Speaker 2: We want to always be that kind of community and to do that we got to obviously pray, but we got to keep naming it.
Speaker 2: We got to keep coming back and putting the biblical vision of community and hospitality before us.
Speaker 2: So that's what we're going to talk about.
Speaker 2: I know you talked about it in KC.
Speaker 2: That's why this is important to us.
Speaker 2: You talked about it this summer in KC.
Speaker 2: We're going to talk about it this morning.
Speaker 2: One verse this morning Romans 12, verse 13.
Speaker 2: This is God's word Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
Speaker 2: The needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.
Speaker 2: This is God's word.
Speaker 2: Let me pray, father, be near to the one who preaches and, for all those that are listening this morning, remind us it's no accident that we're here.
Speaker 2: Would you convict us, but would you also comfort us and, more than anything, may every person in here and those in the overflow and those listening on the live stream.
Speaker 2: May they, all of us, may we have a powerful encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2: I ask these things in his name, amen.
Speaker 2: Hospitality Three things I want to mention about hospitality.
Speaker 2: We're going to look at the priority number one.
Speaker 2: Secondly, the practice.
Speaker 2: Lastly, the power.
Speaker 2: The look at the priority number one.
Speaker 2: Secondly, the practice.
Speaker 2: Lastly, the power.
Speaker 2: The priority, the practice, the power.
Speaker 2: Let's jump in.
Speaker 2: First, the priority Hospitality is all over the Bible.
Speaker 2: Okay, we could spend the rest of our time talking about the verses that mention hospitality.
Speaker 2: What is hospitality?
Speaker 2: Well, the word is specifically defined as the love or welcome of strangers.
Speaker 2: And again, it's everywhere.
Speaker 2: I can't mention all the verses, but in the Old Testament you see it in Leviticus 19,.
Speaker 2: Deuteronomy, chapter 10, over and over, you see God saying things like to his people when you were strangers, when you were outsiders, I welcomed you in.
Speaker 2: Now you go and welcome other strangers.
Speaker 2: In New Testament, luke, chapter 14, the parable of the great banquet, jesus says hey, when you have a dinner, don't invite your friends, don't invite your family.
Speaker 2: Remember what he says Invite the strangers, invite the crippled and the poor and the lame and the blind.
Speaker 2: Matthew, chapter 25, jesus, or you know.
Speaker 2: You might be familiar with this verse.
Speaker 2: I was hungry and you fed me.
Speaker 2: I was thirsty and you gave me water.
Speaker 2: I was a stranger and you brought me in and welcomed me.
Speaker 2: Truly, I say to you, as you did to one of these, you did to me.
Speaker 2: And so hospitality has this outward facing element to it.
Speaker 2: But it also has an inward facing element and dimension to it, and we see that particularly in the New Testament.
Speaker 2: It's set in the context of the church.
Speaker 2: 1 Timothy 3 says one of the qualifications to be a church leader is that they practice hospitality.
Speaker 2: You see it in the New Testament set in the context of the one another commands, an outflow of how we love one another in the family of God.
Speaker 2: You see it in this passage.
Speaker 2: Look at our verse this morning Romans 12, verse 13.
Speaker 2: Contribute to the needs of outsiders.
Speaker 2: That's not what it says.
Speaker 2: It says contribute to the needs of the saints.
Speaker 2: How do we do that?
Speaker 2: By seeking to show hospitality.
Speaker 2: The New International Version says practice hospitality.
Speaker 2: The ESV says seek to show hospitality.
Speaker 2: It's actually way more forceful than that.
Speaker 2: It's better translated strive or actively pursue hospitality.
Speaker 2: In other words, hospitality is not something that's just going to happen.
Speaker 2: It's going to take a lot of work and you've got to think about it and plan for it and make margin for it in your lives and on your calendars.
Speaker 2: Why does the Bible make such a big deal about hospitality?
Speaker 2: Well, part of the reason, real, practically speaking, is because it was necessary.
Speaker 2: Back then, in the ancient world, traveling was very difficult and very dangerous and there were ends that you could stay in.
Speaker 2: There weren't many, and if they had availability you probably did not want to stay there.
Speaker 2: They were often shady places.
Speaker 2: You probably did not want to stay there.
Speaker 2: They were often shady places and so travelers relied on the hospitality of others in order to survive, and so this travel again very difficult.
Speaker 2: It was often they would travel during the daytime because remember the parable of the Good Samaritan Robbers and thieves were active around travelers, and so travel would take place during the daytime and it was exhausting and people were weary, and so they would travel all day and then around sunset they would go to the outer, get outside the gates of the city or the town and they would wait for people to come and invite them in and show them hospitality.
Speaker 2: And someone would come and there would be some vetting.
Speaker 2: There would be some questions because they wanted to make sure this was not an enemy of the town or city that was seeking to take down the city or town.
Speaker 2: And as long as they cleared the questions, then they would invite them to their home, they would wash their feet, they would cook them a warm meal and they would give them a place to lay their head.
Speaker 2: So practically speaking, it was necessary.
Speaker 2: But the other reason why hospitality God makes such a big deal out of it and it should be a priority for us and perhaps more importantly, is because it's one of the ways that the church shows the world what God is like.
Speaker 2: The God of the Bible is a God of hospitality.
Speaker 2: It's a God of welcome.
Speaker 2: You could actually say that the story of the Bible is the story of God showing kindness and hospitality to sinners and strangers like us.
Speaker 2: Think about the beginning of the Bible.
Speaker 2: God created us, put us in a home called the Garden of Eden and God says I will protect you there, I will provide for you there.
Speaker 2: And then Genesis, chapter 3, hits and humanity.
Speaker 2: We say, god, we don't want you Because we don't need you.
Speaker 2: We don't need your protection and your provision.
Speaker 2: And so they ran away from home.
Speaker 2: And the rest of the Bible is about how God chases after his children in order to bring them back home.
Speaker 2: That's the story of the Bible, and the good news of the gospel is that God loved us so much that he took on flesh in the person of Jesus in order to come into this world to bring us back home.
Speaker 2: You get the idea and see very clearly in Luke 15, the parable of the prodigal son.
Speaker 2: Remember the rebellious son runs away from home.
Speaker 2: What does the father do?
Speaker 2: He holds his arms open wide and he welcomes him home.
Speaker 2: And then you remember what the father does he holds his arms open wide and he welcomes him home.
Speaker 2: He shows hospitality, he provides a feast, he throws a party.
Speaker 2: When we open up our homes, when we welcome people in to our groups and to our church and to our home, we embody the gospel and we show the world what God is like.
Speaker 2: That's why the Bible makes such a big deal out of hospitality.
Speaker 2: Over the summer our family took a family trip to London.
Speaker 2: We saw the Broadway musical Les Mis.
Speaker 2: Many of you've read that or perhaps seen that, and if you know the story, hospitality is actually the catalyst that creates the whole story, that creates all of the storyline.
Speaker 2: Valjean is a prisoner and he's in prison for stealing a loaf of bread in order to feed his family.
Speaker 2: He gets paroled and because he's a felon, no one wants anything to do with him.
Speaker 2: He can't find work, he has no place to go and he ends up at the front door of a priest.
Speaker 2: If you remember, the priest opens his door and extends hospitality.
Speaker 2: Listen to the words.
Speaker 2: I wish I could sing this Come in, sir, for you are weary.
Speaker 2: The night is cold out there.
Speaker 2: Though our lives are very humble, what we have we will share.
Speaker 2: There's wine here to revive you, there's food to make you strong, there's a bed to rest till morning.
Speaker 2: Rest from pain and rest from wrong.
Speaker 2: That's hospitality.
Speaker 2: I was reminded of this over the summer and I was reminded of this day one when I was back at the church this week.
Speaker 2: I've said this kinds of things before, but I was reminded again.
Speaker 2: Every week, someone in here is in the middle of the worst week of their life, every week.
Speaker 2: And we want to be a church.
Speaker 2: We want our homes and our grace groups and our student ministry and our kingdom communities to be rest stops for weary travelers who have been beaten down by life, who've been in the middle of their worst week, who have been beaten down by sin and suffering.
Speaker 2: I wish we could put a sign I don't know how we do this, but put a sign out in front of our church faith church, a resting place for weary travelers, a place of healing and a place of hope, a place where we say come on in, it's cold out there, come and rest.
Speaker 2: What we have we will share, rest from pain and rest from wrong.
Speaker 2: As we move into this next season of ministry, as we grow as a church, let us never forget to keep hospitality a priority in our church and in our community, because when we do, we proclaim the gospel.
Speaker 2: Secondly, the practice of hospitality.
Speaker 2: We normally, when we hear the words hospitality because we're Southerners we normally immediately think entertainment, we think garden and gun, we think southern living.
Speaker 2: That's not hospitality.
Speaker 2: One distinction between biblical hospitality and entertaining is that entertaining focuses on the host.
Speaker 2: In other words, entertaining is often all about you.
Speaker 2: When we entertain, we are concerned what others will think about us, what they'll think about our home, what they'll think about the manners of our children, how nice our serving ware is, how clean our home is, how stylish or well-decorated it is Nothing wrong with those things.
Speaker 2: That's just not biblical hospitality.
Speaker 2: Biblical hospitality, the focus is not you, it's on your guest, it's on other people.
Speaker 2: It's on other people.
Speaker 2: It's on the people that God puts in front of you Again, whether in your home or at a small group or over coffee, your concern is with them.
Speaker 2: Let me say it another way Entertainment seeks to impress.
Speaker 2: Biblical hospitality seeks to see and know and love the people that God has put in front of you.
Speaker 2: Biblical hospitality is curious.
Speaker 2: It slows down, it listens, it spends time with people in order to love and serve them and get to know them and when it happens, it is a very powerful thing.
Speaker 2: I read a story recently about Mary Carr.
Speaker 2: She has a memoir.
Speaker 2: She talks about a time when she was 14 and she got really depressed and sad and one night, when her parents were out, she tried to take her own life.
Speaker 2: She was unsuccessful and wound up really sick and when her parents came home she said she just had food poisoning.
Speaker 2: But she said my father knew me and he looked into my eyes and he suspected that there was something deeper going on and he asked the question is there anything that you would like to eat?
Speaker 2: Is there anything that would sound good to you?
Speaker 2: And she said all that she could think of that would sound good were plums.
Speaker 2: And plums were out of season, and so she just went to bed.
Speaker 2: She woke up the next morning to a bushel full of plums.
Speaker 2: Her father had driven through the night from Texas to Arkansas to get them.
Speaker 2: And in her memoir listen to what she says it's when you sink your teeth into the plum that you make a promise.
Speaker 2: The skin on the plum is still warm from riding in the sun in your daddy's truck and the nectar runs down your chin and you snap out of it or are snapped out of it.
Speaker 2: Never again will you lay a hand against yourself, not as long as there are plums to eat and somebody, anybody, who cares enough to haul them to you.
Speaker 2: The power of hospitality.
Speaker 2: Why is it so powerful?
Speaker 2: Well, because every human being wants to be known and loved.
Speaker 2: Every single one of us wants to be seen.
Speaker 2: It's why we make such a big deal.
Speaker 2: You make such a big deal about people remembering your name, because everybody longs for a tangible expression of love, and when you get it and experience it.
Speaker 2: It is life-changing.
Speaker 2: I want to put it in theological terms Scholars say that hospitality is sacramental.
Speaker 2: Want to put it in theological terms.
Speaker 2: Scholars say that hospitality is sacramental.
Speaker 2: What does that mean?
Speaker 2: Well, think about a sacrament.
Speaker 2: You saw baptism this morning.
Speaker 2: We'll do the Lord's Supper In a sacrament.
Speaker 2: You have this common stuff of life, like bread and water and wine, and we set it apart and this common thing becomes a vehicle for God's power and grace in our lives.
Speaker 2: And so when scholars say that hospitality is sacramental, here's all they're saying Is that hospitality is powerful and that God often uses it and works through it in a very powerful way.
Speaker 2: When you experience hospitality, something happens.
Speaker 2: And so, when you take someone to coffee, when you have someone in your home, when you listen to someone, when you invite someone into your grace group or invite them to be part of your activity, when you slow down and have eyes to see another person in their suffering, god can and you know this because you've experienced it often uses those things in very powerful ways.
Speaker 2: If we could say this another way, we would say hospitality is mission.
Speaker 2: You see, not only do I think hospitality is vital for our church as we move forward into a new season of ministry, if we're going to, as we grow, still feel small.
Speaker 2: Hospitality is a centerpiece of that.
Speaker 2: Hospitality is also, I believe, vital if we're going to reach our current generation and the next generation with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2: Friends, reaching the next generation, this current generation, it's not going to come through standing on a street corner yelling, turn or burn.
Speaker 2: That's not going to work.
Speaker 2: It's not going to come from us having better arguments Look, they don't care about our arguments.
Speaker 2: It's not going to come even through programs.
Speaker 2: You know how it's going to come.
Speaker 2: Come over for dinner, let's hang out.
Speaker 2: I want to get to know you.
Speaker 2: Reaching people comes through building relationships in our workplace and in our schools and in our neighborhoods and just simply getting around the dinner table.
Speaker 2: Look up Rosaria Butterfield's story.
Speaker 2: Lesbian professor from Syracuse hated Christianity.
Speaker 2: How did she become a Christian?
Speaker 2: Because someone said come over for dinner.
Speaker 2: In dozens of meals around someone's table, she becomes a Christian.
Speaker 2: The early church how did the early church get off the ground?
Speaker 2: Wasn't through flashy programs.
Speaker 2: Programs are great, but you know how it got off the ground?
Speaker 2: Yes, word, yes, spirit, but practically speaking, getting in one another's homes Through the ministry of hospitality.
Speaker 2: The gospels, jesus tells us he comes into the world.
Speaker 2: His mission is what?
Speaker 2: To seek and save the lost.
Speaker 2: His mission is he came not to be served, but to serve and give him life as a ransom for many.
Speaker 2: That's his mission.
Speaker 2: What's his method?
Speaker 2: It was hospitality.
Speaker 2: Luke, chapter 7, verse 34, the Son of man came eating and drinking, so much so that Jesus was accused of being a drunkard and a glutton.
Speaker 2: Jesus accomplished his mission around the dinner table through hospitality.
Speaker 2: That must be part of our mission and method too.
Speaker 2: So, really quickly, here's my question.
Speaker 2: You've missed it, I'm sure.
Speaker 2: What does this mean for a two o'clock on a Tuesday afternoon?
Speaker 2: Lots of things.
Speaker 2: Let me mention a couple real practical things.
Speaker 2: Here's one thing I was convicted of in the last several weeks, because God has been working in me through this idea of hospitality and through it.
Speaker 2: One of the things that I am repenting of is I'm way too busy.
Speaker 2: I'm too busy and too going all over the place to actually slow down and see another person, and I would suspect that's your story too.
Speaker 2: We live in a world that's way too busy, very over committed, that we don't have time for people, and so we rush around from one activity to the other.
Speaker 2: We do not have margin in our life for hospitality or for having people in our home or getting together with people, and so we've got to remember this passage.
Speaker 2: It says it's not going to just happen right.
Speaker 2: We have to strive and seek to show hospitality.
Speaker 2: And so it's going to take lots of planning, it's going to take getting out in the calendar, it's going to take being very intentional.
Speaker 2: It might mean getting involved in a ministry that's happening organically in our church, called house to house.
Speaker 2: You heard about this.
Speaker 2: We've got older kingdom communities that are inviting younger kingdom communities and younger people in our church into their home so that they can get to know them and start hanging out with one another.
Speaker 2: It means getting in a grace group.
Speaker 2: That's not just preacher talk.
Speaker 2: We really do want every person in this church in a grace group.
Speaker 2: That's not just preacher talk.
Speaker 2: We really do want every person in this church in a grace group.
Speaker 2: Why?
Speaker 2: Because it makes this room smaller and it's a place where you are known and loved.
Speaker 2: It means, if you're a grace group leader, that sometimes maybe dial back on the content so that you can go to dinner, that you can bring dinner in and simply hang out with one another and build relationships with each other.
Speaker 2: It might mean us slowing down and remembering the point of hospitality, remembering that it's okay not to be perfect.
Speaker 2: Because here's the truth If we're focused on and insisting that the food be perfect, the home be perfect, the kids be perfect, guess what?
Speaker 2: It's never going to be and we'll never do hospitality.
Speaker 2: It'll be too overwhelming.
Speaker 2: And so let's just start inviting people into our lives and into our brokenness and into the realness of our stories.
Speaker 2: You see, the point of hospitality is to spend time with one another.
Speaker 2: So go be hospitable.
Speaker 2: Let's pray.
Speaker 2: I'm kidding.
Speaker 2: If you've been around here, you know me better than that.
Speaker 2: Where's the power for hospitality?
Speaker 2: How do we get there?
Speaker 2: Where are the resources?
Speaker 2: Well, look at our chapter here, chapter 12 of the book of romans.
Speaker 2: You'll see, in this passage, the context is the gospel.
Speaker 2: Look at chapter 12, verses 1 and 2.
Speaker 2: Notice this comes before.
Speaker 2: No, this is obvious, but we've got to Notice this comes before.
Speaker 2: I know this is obvious, but we've got to get this.
Speaker 2: This comes before verses 9 and following.
Speaker 2: Look at chapter 12, verses 1 and 2.
Speaker 2: In view of God's mercy and grace to you in Christ Jesus, then in light of what God's done for you.
Speaker 2: Now go verse 13, and contribute to the needs of the saints and show hospitality.
Speaker 2: What God has done, then what we must do.
Speaker 2: And if we don't get that, or if we reverse the order, then hospitality will feel like drudgery and it will be burdensome, and that is not Christianity.
Speaker 2: You won't do it.
Speaker 2: You'll regret it.
Speaker 2: That's religion.
Speaker 2: Now, you see, religion says be hospitable so you can be a good Christian, or be hospitable so God will love you.
Speaker 2: Christianity says no, god has welcomed me.
Speaker 2: God has shown me radical hospitality so I can go and show that same hospitality to others.
Speaker 2: In other words, the gospel is the fuel and the power for you being hospitable, but also for our church being a church of hospitality.
Speaker 2: Ephesians 2 says you were strangers to God and without hope, but God brought you near.
Speaker 2: He brought you near through the person of Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2: When Christ died, it was the opposite of hospitality.
Speaker 2: Remember, hospitality in the ancient world was going outside the gate and meeting and waiting on someone On the cross.
Speaker 2: Jesus was in before and on the cross he was cast outside the gate.
Speaker 2: Remember he said my God, my God, why have you forsaken me?
Speaker 2: Jesus got what we deserved.
Speaker 2: Jesus stood in our place.
Speaker 2: Jesus, you could say, experienced cosmic homelessness so that we could experience the radical hospitality of our God.
Speaker 2: He paid for our sins so that God could bring us into his home and so that we could be in the house of God forever.
Speaker 2: I'll close with this.
Speaker 2: I'm sure you've watched the Olympics, or at least familiar that the Olympics just happened.
Speaker 2: I hope the Olympic basketball team won their gold medal again and the coach of the Olympic basketball team was Steve Kerr, who's also the coach of the Golden State Warriors.
Speaker 2: And there's an article years ago in ESPN magazine when he first started at Golden State and he was talking about how he was transforming the team into a winning team and a successful team.
Speaker 2: And he said in order for us to do that, in order for us to be successful, we must transition from an offense that is heavy isolation.
Speaker 2: And if you don't know basketball, then that heavy isolation is when you just throw the ball to one person and it's a one-man show or a one-woman show, and they just take the ball and go to the basket and do their thing.
Speaker 2: And so he's pushing against that and he's saying we must transition from heavy isolation to heavy passing and ball movement and he goes.
Speaker 2: This will be dramatic, but more people will be involved in the offense, and the more people that are involved in the offense, the more powerful it will become.
Speaker 2: I think that's true of the church.
Speaker 2: You could say that, as Christians, the more people we have involved in showing and practicing hospitality, the more powerful the church becomes.
Speaker 2: Think about the early church.
Speaker 2: That's what we're after here at Faith for everyone to be involved in hospitality.
Speaker 2: Because, you see, it's really common as churches grow and you know this that as churches grow, people start to fall through the cracks.
Speaker 2: And if you're here this morning, maybe you feel like you're fall through the cracks.
Speaker 2: And if you're here this morning, maybe you feel like you're falling through the cracks.
Speaker 2: And if that's true of you, I want to just tell you that I'm really sorry that you feel that way.
Speaker 2: That's not what we want.
Speaker 2: We want everybody again, it's not just preacher talk.
Speaker 2: We want everybody in this church to be known and loved.
Speaker 2: Our vision is that everyone, no matter what you're going through, whether you're experiencing sorrow or joy, that you have someone here that you can turn to, because they know you and you know that they love you.
Speaker 2: We want to be a church.
Speaker 2: I want the surrounding community to look at faith and say I don't know what's going on there, but they share life together, they love one another, and for that to happen, everyone must take responsibility for engaging in the ministry of hospitality.
Speaker 2: How does that happen?
Speaker 2: Happen by experiencing the radical and the sacrificial hospitality of Jesus, because when we experience the love of Jesus for us, it is an overflow, and a natural overflow that we start extending to other people.
Speaker 2: And so you see where this is going.
Speaker 2: Jesus has got to stay center here.
Speaker 2: Jesus and his work and his love for us must stay at the very center of all of our groups, all of our ministries, our worship service, because we have got to stay near to him, because that's where we are healed, and that is when this ministry of hospitality begins to explode in our midst.
Speaker 2: I don't know where you are this morning.
Speaker 2: I don't know what brought you here.
Speaker 2: I don't know what you are this morning.
Speaker 2: I don't know what brought you here.
Speaker 2: I don't know what you did last night.
Speaker 2: I don't know where you've been.
Speaker 2: But here's what I do know it's not an accident that you're here this morning.
Speaker 2: Maybe you feel like a weary traveler and life is just beating you down.
Speaker 2: You've been beaten down by sin and suffering.
Speaker 2: Maybe you, when I said the worst week of my life, maybe you would raise your hand and say that's me.
Speaker 2: And you know what I want you to hear this morning.
Speaker 2: I want you to hear Jesus saying come on in, welcome.
Speaker 2: There is rest here for you.
Speaker 2: Come to me, all you who are weary and heavy laden, and I will give rest for your souls, and so will you come to him.
Speaker 2: Whether it's your first time or thousandth time, will you come to Jesus this morning?
Speaker 2: And yes, that's an invitation.
Speaker 2: Let's pray Father, thank you that while we were strangers and far off, you sent Jesus to come get us.
Speaker 2: Would you forgive us for our rebellion?
Speaker 2: Would you forgive us for running away?
Speaker 2: Holy Spirit, I pray that you would come.
Speaker 2: Part of your role in the Trinity is to point to Jesus and help us to experience very tangibly the love of Jesus, and so I pray that you would, now, as we come to the table, that you would do that in such a way that we would extend hospitality to others and that it would be a mark of our lives and a mark of our church.
Speaker 2: In Jesus' name, amen.