David Orendorff Matthew 11:28-30

Last week’s sermon was in response to Jesus saying, “Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.”  This led me into a discussion of the honor or status code which instructed the Mediterranean folks of who should be welcomed and who should be refused.  Which led to a discussion of what Christ-like hospitality might be for us?

After I was done with the sermon and while in the scripture discussion class I realized one more thing.  That a major difference in status based acceptance and Christian based hospitality is that for the Christian hospitality is about receiving (not taking) life as it comes.  Every guest (person, event, even suffering or enemy) is a messenger from God and one to be served.

In this light when Jesus says, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” he is saying that he (and so our heavenly Father) receives and welcomes the weary and heavy laden to his home with rest.

While meditating on this I thought of the Greek the word for hospitality.  In the Greek “hospitality” is a compound word composed of φιλΟσ (which is a friendship sort of love - Philadelphia) and ξενοσ (which is stranger = Xenophobia); and literally means lover or friend to strangers.

When in Romans 12:9-21 Paul is listing the marks of a Christian and says, “extend hospitality to strangers” he means to extend friendship, not just politeness, to strangers.  And in his letter to Titus when Paul says that a bishop, as God’s steward, “must be hospitable” he means that the bishop should reach out with friendship to strangers.  It is by such Christian hospitality that Matthew the tax collector, is saved by Jesus’ radical hospitality.

I like Henri Nouwen’s definition of hospitality this:

Hospitality … means primarily the creation of a free space where the stranger can enter and become a friend instead of an enemy. Hospitality is not to change people, but to offer them space where change can take place. It is not to bring men and women over to our side, but to offer freedom not disturbed by dividing lines. It is not to lead our neighbor into a corner where there are no alternatives left, but to open a wide spectrum of options for choice and commitment. It is not an educated intimidation with good books, good stories and good works, but the liberation of fearful hearts so that words can find roots and bear ample fruit. It is not a method of making our God and our way into the criteria of happiness, but the opening of an opportunity to others to find their God and their way. The paradox of hospitality is that it wants to create emptiness, not a fearful emptiness, but a friendly emptiness where strangers can enter and discover themselves as created free; free to sing their own songs, speak their own languages, dance their own dances; free also to leave and follow their own vocations. Hospitality is not a subtle invitation to adopt the life style of the host, but the gift of a chance for the guest to find his (or her) own.

The opening scene of the movie version of Les Miserable offers a perfect example of the opportunity hospitality can be for the guest.

Jean Valjean is just released from prison.  (show clip).

He is hungry, but worse, he is without money to travel to where he is to report to the court’s officer.  He knocks upon the door of the Bishop/Pastor of a small congregation.  The Bishop, much to the concern of his wife, welcomes Jean Valjean into his home.”1 Henri Nouwen, Reaching Out: Threes Movements of the Spiritual Life

The Bishop and his wife feed Jean Valjean supper and invite him to stay the night.  In the middle of the night Jean steals the silverware.  The Bishop discovers him and Jean Valjean, a strong man from his time at hard labor, punches the Bishop, knocks him out and flees.  The next day the police capture Jean Valjean and return him to the Bishop.  Jean Valjean has told the police that the Bishop gave him the silver.  The Bishop, much to the irritation of his wife, backs Jean Valjean up, even tells him he forgot the silver candlesticks and Jean Valjean is released.  The Bishop tells Jean Valjean, “Jean Valjean, my brother, you no longer belong to evil.  With this silver, I have bought your soul.  I’ve ransomed you from fear and hatred.  And now, you belong to God.”

The Bishop, like Jesus in feeding the hungry, calling the children to him, eating with tax collectors and sinners, reaching out to lepers and maniacs, embodies for us the meaning of Christ-like hospitality that truly eases burdens and offers the opportunity for new life.

We know this personally because we have been the stranger who was rescued by the gracious and forgiving friendship of another.  And sometimes we have been honored and blessed to be a friend to a stranger, offering our humble grace and faulty forgiveness.  It might have been a true stranger in one we do not yet know, or perhaps the sometimes strangeness of friends and family, or even the stranger in ourselves that welcomed and to whom we gave rest.  By our hospitality we do for others what has been done for us, we purchase their souls from evil so they no longer belong to fear and hatred, but like Jean Valjean, belong to God and find rest.

This kind of burden lifting hospitality made me think of our burglars.  It seems we are calendared on the six month rotation list of the local burglar society. Every six months someone slips in or breaks in and takes something.  This last time three microphones and all the listening assistance devices were taken.  From this I deduce, in Holmesian fashion, that our burglar must be somewhat deaf.  There is no other logical explanation so don’t even start with me.

My mother reacted particularly strongly to this last burglary because she really needs the listening devices to hear what is happening in worship.  But worse, the last burglar took the little Habitat for Humanity bank on the mission table.  Mom is a volunteer with Habitat and a goodly portion of her change was in that bank. Suddenly it was doubly personal.

But think with me for a moment.  What would be a Christ-like response we might have to being burgled?  The Sufi poet Rumi suggests a possibility in one of his poems:

This being human is a guest house
every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they are a crowd of sorrows
who violently sweep your house
empty of all its furniture,
still treat each guest honorably.
He may be cleaning you out
for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing
and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from the beyond.”

Perhaps instead of yelling thief and feeling violated we might choose to see what gift the burglar has brought us.  But whether we can do that or not, we can pray that the microphones and listening devices as gifts of silver which will somehow ransom the burglar from fear and hatred so that now our burglar belongs too God.  I do pray for our burglar to know that he or she does indeed belong to God and can have a new life of rest, of shalom.

Shalom and Amen.

[1] Henri Nouwen, Reaching Out: Threes Movements of the Spiritual Life