Today's Sermon: Welcome to the Table
Love Your Neighbor: Part Five

Definition of Hospitality

“Hospitality”- The act of opening our homes to others in a welcoming and receptive manner that provides an occasion to meet the physical, social, emotional and spiritual needs of those around us.

Purpose of Hospitality

1) Meet Physical Needs- Genesis 18:1-8, 19:1-3

2) Meet Social Needs- Mark 2:13-17

3) Meet Emotional Needs-

4) Meet Spiritual Needs-

Central to Hospitality is the Table

“The way we participate in salvation has to be in continuity with the way Jesus accomplished salvation, namely, in all the immediate details that make up history — not a generalized “world history” but a storied local and personal history. That is why the focal practice for participating in Jesus’ work of salvation is not a detached verbal act but a meal, an event that employs all the senses and can occur only in specific places with named people, requiring a language that is personal and conversational. A meal engages personal participation at the most basic level of our lives. It is virtually impossible to be detached and uninvolved when we are sharing a meal with someone…Will we replace Jesus’ humility with our grandiosity? Preparing and cooking, serving and eating meals are Jesus-sanctioned activities that provide daily structure to our participation in the work of salvation.
-Eugene Peterson, Christ Plays in Ten Thousand Places (p. 217, 220)

Ultimate Hospitality is the Lord’s Table