Divine Appointments

Dannah Gresh: Is your idea of hospitality a once-a-year holiday party? Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth wants to expand your horizons a little.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Hospitality for the Old Testament Jews was not an event; it was a way of life, and it’s intended to be a way of life for us.

Dannah: This is the Revive Our Hearts podcast with Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth, author of Choosing Gratitude, for Monday, April 15, 2024. I’m Dannah Gresh.

Today is the first day of the Revive Our Hearts Spring Sale! Here’s the deal: beautiful flowers fade, clothing styles change, and trinkets collect dust, but we can bank on this—the Word of God stands forever! So, check out the Spring Sale at ReviveOurHearts.com for biblically-focused gifts that will leave a lasting impact on the life of your mom, your dad, a bridal couple, or grad! For all the details, check out ReviveOurHearts.com.

Now, if you approach the Old Testament stories with a twenty-first-century mindset, you'll miss details in those stories about hospitality. Nancy's helping us see these stories with a fresh perspective as she continues in a series called “You’re Welcome Here.” 

Nancy: We’ve been talking all this week about the ministry of hospitality and how we can reflect the hospitable heart of God by opening our hearts and our homes to other people.

 

Now as you get into the Scripture and study hospitality you see in the Old Testament many, many illustrations of hospitality. Hospitality for the Old Testament Jews was not an event. It was a way of life, and it’s intended to be a way of life for us.

You see, the Old Testament Jews believed that because God was their host, therefore, they were obligated to show hospitality to others.

We looked yesterday at the verse in Deuteronomy where it says that God “loves the stranger giving him food and clothing. Therefore [you are to] love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt," God said to His people (Deut. 10:18–19).

For those Old Testament Jews, hospitality was a sacred duty. It was unthinkable to refuse hospitality to a needy person. It was expected. It was not an option. And those who were traveling or those who were poor and needy had a right to expect that if they came to your house, they could find hospitality—that you would provide food and lodging, whatever was needed to meet their needs, and that they would also be given whatever is needed to send them on their journey.

I read this past week about some of the literature of the New Testament rabbis as they spoke about hospitality, and they got this heart from the Old Testament. 

It was said that rabbis suggested “that every household should have doors on every side of the house. These doors should be open so that travelers and the poor coming from any side might have easy access.” What a picture of hospitality—a door on every side of the house and the doors always open so anyone could come in.

It was said by one particular rabbi, Rabbi Hunah, “observed the custom of opening the doors of your house when he was about to take his meal, saying, ‘Anyone who is hungry may come in and eat.’”

In Jerusalem it was said, in this rabbinical literature, that the Jews had a custom of displaying a flag in front of a door to indicate the meal was ready and that the guest might come in and join.

They even said that you should extend your meal as long as you could so that those who were late would still have time to come and get in for the meal. And they said that it was considered the duty of the host to be cheerful during the meals in order to make the guest feel at home and comfortable at the table. 

So you see, hospitality was a way of life for the Jews—always having an open heart and that meant having an open home.

Now the Jews of Jesus' day thought of Abraham, their father in the faith, as the supreme model of hospitality. And so to look at an Old Testament model of hospitality, I thought it would be helpful to go back to the Book of Genesis. If you have your Bible, let me invite you to turn to Genesis 18 where we see one illustration of Abraham offering hospitality.

In this passage we see insights about what it means to extend Christian hospitality. Genesis 18, we're looking at the first eight verses. Now, let me say, the purpose of this passage is not primarily to teach about hospitality. God was coming to tell Abraham that Sarah was going to have a child, ninety-year-old Sarah was going to have a baby. This was God's means of getting a message to Abraham.

But it's interesting how hospitality plays into this whole story and becomes an important part of Abraham receiving that message. Verse 1 tells us:

Then the Lord appeared to him by the terebinth trees of Mamre, as he was sitting in the tent door in the heat of the day.

Abraham is sitting here at noon time, afternoon. It's the hottest time of the day. And he's resting himself from the desert heat, and the Lord appears to him. Now, we know it was the Lord because the Scripture says it was. But Abraham apparently does not know at first that this is the Lord.

In fact, it's interesting that the blessing Abraham received in this encounter and the revelation God gave him (about what God was going to do) came after Abraham extended hospitality.

I think of how (humanly speaking) Abraham could have missed the blessing God had for him if hospitality had not been a way of life for him. It makes me wonder, How many blessings does God have for us and how many times does He want to reveal Himself and His heart and His ways to us, but we miss it because our home is closed. God has blessings and rewards He wants to share with us, and we may miss them if we don't open our homes.

So the Lord comes, and verse 2 says: 

So he lifted his eyes and looked, and behold, three men were standing by him. 

Now we know as we get into the rest of the passage that one of those men was actually God Himself making an Old Testament appearance; two of the men were angels.

That’s where in the New Testament we read that some have opened their homes to strangers have entertained angels without realizing it (see Heb. 13:2).

But all Abraham knows is that there are three men who are passing by his tent here in the desert in the heat of the day. And when he saw them, you get the picture here that this isn't something he stopped and thought about, he just did it spontaneously. 

He ran from the tent door to meet them, and he bowed himself to the ground, and said, "My Lord, if I have now found favor in Your sight, do not pass on by Your servant. Please let a little water be brought, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree. And I will bring you a morsel of bread, that you may refresh your hearts. After that you may pass by, inasmuch as you have come to your servant." They said, “Do as you have said." (vv. 2–5) 

Now, I see in this passage that Abraham is just expecting to be hospitable. He is not sitting here and thinking, Now, do I have time today to show hospitality to these strangers? What's on my schedule today.

I am sure Abraham had things on his schedule. But whatever they were, he was flexible. We see him as a host being a humble host. He bowed himself to the ground, and the way he addressed these strangers. He said, "If I have found favor in Your sight, don't pass by."

He is saying in effect, "You have done me a great honor by visiting me. It's a privilege that you would come to my tent."

Do you feel that way when people drop by your house? Unexpectedly? At lunch time? Or dinner time? "Oh what a blessing that you would stop by!" Now, you can probably think of some people who make you feel that way, but not everyone finds that easy.

I confess that sometimes when I have my own agenda, my to-do list, my things that I'm working on, my schedule mapped out for the day, it's not always easy when the phone rings and people say, "We're coming through town. We'd like to see you."

Or the doorbell rings and . . . My house is situated in a place where my house is very accessible, and my doorbell does often ring. People just stop by, and sometimes it's hard to receive guests spontaneously. Sometimes it's hard to communicate the spirit of you're welcome here.

But I see in Abraham a great example of one saying, "This is an honor that you would visit me." Notice his focus as a host is on the guests, not on himself. I think that's what the heart of hospitality is.

My focus is on you, not on me, not on my house, not on all the things that I haven't picked up and I'm embarrassed that you're seeing my house as it is. But my focus is on you—making you feel comfortable, making you feel welcome. "It's my joy to serve you." I sense Abraham saying that.

He extends himself in a practical way to meet their needs. He's alert and sensitive to what their needs are. It is hot. They've been traveling. He knows they are probably thirsty. He knows they're probably hungry. So, he's attentive and tuned to how he can meet their practical needs.

I've had different people stay in my home with different kinds of needs or different people come to my house: 

• Sometimes they are hungry and need something to eat.
• Or they’re thirsty. 
• Sometimes they need a warm fire in the fireplace because it's a cold day outside and their heart is cold, and they need the physical and spiritual atmosphere to warm their heart.
• Sometimes they just need somebody to listen. 
• Sometimes they just need a hug, just a physical embrace to say, "You are loved." 
• Sometimes they just need a quiet place. 

I have guests sometimes that just need me to stay out of the way so that they can get some quiet time and just be refreshed and encouraged on their own with the Lord.

I've had a mother, a homeschooling mom, call me to say, "Could I just come and spend the morning sitting in your house? I won't bother you. I just need a place to be quiet, to think, and to pray."

I said, "Come on over, my home is your home, use it."

Well here Abraham sees the practical needs of his guests and he says, "Let a little water be brought, wash your feet, and rest yourselves. I'll get some bread. Refresh your hearts." You see, in extending practical hospitality he's also ministering to their spiritual needs, to their heart needs. He's providing rest and refreshment for his guests.

And then verse 6 tells us that this is not always easy. There's effort involved in extending hospitality. "So he hastened into the tent to Sarah," good old Sarah. Wasn't it a good thing Sarah was there because I don't think Abraham could have handled this on his own. 

He hastened into the tent to Sarah and said, "Quickly, make ready three measures of fine meal; knead it and make cakes."

Now that strikes me as funny when I read it because I can't imagine baking bread quickly. When we think of doing something quickly today, we don't think of baking bread. That just shows we live with a whole different concept of time than they did in those days. Grind the flour, mix it together, knead it, bake it, and do it quickly. And then verse 7 tells us: 

Abraham ran to the herd, took a tender and good calf, gave it to a young man, [one of the household helpers] and he hastened to prepare it. 

So he's going out; he's finding a live animal. I mean he's going hunting for the meal, but he's doing it quickly. 

So he took butter and milk and the calf which he had prepared, and set it before them; and he stood by them under the tree as they ate. (v. 8)

Hospitality involves work. It involves effort. And it involves sharing what belongs to you and sometimes sacrificing if you don't have a lot. 

And I see here that hospitality is a family effort. They were involved in this together. We're going to talk about how your family can be involved together in the ministry of hospitality. 

And then we see that hospitality means the host has to have a servant's heart. Just that last little phrase, "he stood by them under the tree as they ate" (v. 8).

That was considered appropriate and polite in the Old Testament culture. As your guests were eating, you would stand by them. Why? Because you were their servant. You said, "Come into my home, and let me serve you." So when we extend hospitality, we are showing the servant heart of Jesus. Abraham was the kind of host that I want to be: spontaneous, flexible, open-tent, open-home, open-heart, "Come in and be refreshed.”

Thank You Father for giving us examples of how to be a good host. In this model of Abraham we see the model of Your heart, and how You are hastening to show mercy and grace and refreshment and kindness to us.

Help us to be hosts with a servant’s heart, to be willing to lay aside our own plans, to focus on people rather than things, to be generous, kind, and sensitive, flexible and available, to host others as You have hosted us. I pray in Jesus’ name, amen. 

Dannah: Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth has been helping all of us prepare for interruptions to our day. Maybe that interruption is exactly the meeting the Lord has ordained for you.

We’d like to share with you the story of a woman who had the kind of hospitable attitude we’ve been hearing about. Like Abraham and Sarah, she went out of her way to show hospitality to some travelers in need. Here’s one of our producers, Phil Krause, with the story.

Phil Krause: How would you respond if your out-of-town guests, whom you thought were going to stay for just a few days, ended up staying for weeks? That happened to Martha Jongewaard. It didn’t faze her in the least. More about that in a moment.

Hospitality has always been a special part of Martha’s eighty-year life.

Martha Jongewaard: My parents loved having company, and my mom was the ultimate hostess. So, I mean, I just grew up with having people in, whether it was a foreign student in town, this little old town in the middle of Minnesota, or elementary school teachers. They were always invited for supper, and school friends came for lunch. It was a part of my growing up.

Phil: If you’re looking for a good definition of hospitality, Martha would encourage you not to overthink it.

Martha: You know, it says in Romans 12 to practice hospitality. So you read the Bible, and you say, “Oh, it says I'm supposed to practice hospitality. Hmm. I wonder how you do that! Well, let me see . . .” No, it’s just a natural part of our Christian lives. I always say, “People before things.” They're kind of my favorite hobby—people.

Phil: That hobby came in handy over the decades, as Martha served as a missionary in the country of Austria from 1972 until 2009. It was in the city of Salzburg that Martha first met Eva.

Eva Wenzl: I've actually known Martha since I was a teenager. She was in the main capital in Vienna, and then she moved to Salzburg, to my hometown. She came to our church, and we're ministering in our church. 

Martha: I was at the same church as Eva, her mom, and her grandma . . . and, of course, others.

Eva: She's such a lovely person, full of energy. She can listen and remember a lot and is really attentive.

Martha: And Simona came to town to study music at the Mozarteum, which is a music academy there.

Simona Gallova: I met her also in the church. She's a musician. I'm a musician. So we spoke about music. That was my first connection, at the piano.

Phil: Martha moved back to the U.S. in 2009, but Eva and Simona kept in touch with her. Then, in 2021, they were invited by the German Revive Our Hearts team to visit our headquarters in Michigan. Eva remembers how she felt.

Eva: I was so excited for the trip. 

Phil: The worst of the COVID-19 pandemic was behind, and international travel was opening back up.

Eva: It was just possible to get flights to the U.S. again, and yeah, I was really excited. We talked together. We always said on the flight, “Oh, maybe a new adventure will begin!”

Phil: Little did Eva and Simona know what their new adventure would look like! They decided to make a stop in Minnesota first. They wanted to see Martha before they went on to visit Revive Our Hearts.

Eva: We said, “Oh, can we come to you?” 

And she said, “Yes, you're always welcome.”

Martha: We had a great Christmas Eve. They came on Christmas Eve day, and then we had a wonderful Christmas day together. That was a Saturday. Sunday we went to church.And that evening, Sunday evening, Eva started not feeling very well. 

Eva: I had a cold, and we said, “No, it's not COVID. It's not COVID. No, it's just I’m a little bit tired from the flight and jet lag.

Martha: So the next day, Monday, Simona and I went right down to the drugstore and bought some supplies and an oximeter and some COVID strips, just in case, and etc., etc. And sure enough, she had COVID.

Eva: It was clear that it was COVID. The test was positive.

Martha: We scurried around and tried to get her comfortable. Now, I have a small apartment here. It's maybe 600 square feet, and one bedroom, and then a living room kitchen combined. 

So one of them was on the couch, and one was on the floor on kind of an air mattress setup. And that would have been fine for one week, however. So we're scurrying around and organizing food and getting some groceries on hand and feeling fine, both of us, but poor Eva there on the couch. Well, by Wednesday, Simona wasn't feeling well. And so, she tested positive. And by Friday, yours truly, although I was trying to hide out in my bedroom and stay away from them as much as I could in a small apartment, so there we were.

Simona: There was so much uncertainty. Of course thoughts entered my mind, Why here? Why Lord? How should we handle? How should we organize it? How should we get back? When should we get back? But in all these questions, we knew this is no accident. And God is still in control. 

Eva: It's only a two-room apartment for us three. Martha is over seventy-five; I was anxious, because I have infected them. And now, “Please, Lord, don't don't let that get worse and worse.”

Martha: One would get up and fix a little bite of something to eat and then flop back into bed. Exhaustion was the main problem. You’re not even able to take the dishes to the sink. You’re just so exhausted you fall back into bed and sleep for twenty-four hours.

Eva: Martha was for two days really silent. That’s not typical for her. She’s always full of energy. She slept for two days. One day I got up and said, “Simona, I can’t hear her any more.” I was terrified.” But she had slept for two days. I took care of her those days.

Phil: So the recipients of Martha’s hospitality were now able to dispense it themselves! Simona appreciated seeing the body of Christ functioning like it should.

Simona: I felt like Martha was connected to the church, and through these connections, we were also involved in this love. They took care of us, and they organized every little detail for us—beginning from medical care and flights and food and flowers and little surprises. 

Martha: One example of hospitality of my church family to us was we have a doctor in our church. And their doctor in Austria was giving them prescriptions of medications. But because they were foreigners, they couldn't just take their foreign prescription. So I translated into English and gave it to Doc Erickson. And he went down, gave us a prescription, and we went to the pharmacy and got their things in a roundabout way. That’s another example of God uses us in times of need and hospitality.

Phil: The visit that was supposed to last only a few days stretched into five weeks, due to quarantine restrictions. All three of them had to test negative for a full two weeks before they could get back on an airplane. And while Eva and Simona’s visit to Revive Our Hearts is yet future, they still see God’s hand in their trial. 

Simona: Well, I can say, if you come with hard times with your friend, it will deepen your relationship. So, it was a hard time for us, but the memory is sweet, and it's nice. We are somewhere else in the connections to Martha and also to this church and also to the Lord. I can say He put us out to bring us closer to Him through the situation. 

Eva: It was grace, all of the Lord’s grace.

Martha: But I really like Ecclesiastes 11:6, “Sow your seed in the morning, and do not be idle in the evening, for you do not know whether morning or evening sowing will succeed or whether both of them alike will be good.” To me hospitality is sowing seed. 

We sow the seed of God's Word, and we sow His loving kindness to others around us and whether it's my neighbors down the hall, or whether it's somebody from far away, like Eva and Simona, and whether it's morning or evening, it doesn't really matter. Sometimes a knock comes on the door six o'clock in the evening, and I'm kind of tired and, Oh, well, Debbie is here. So I'll go, “Come on in have a bite of supper because I'm just fixing supper.” It's any time of day or night, we should be ready to share our lives with others.

Dannah: What an amazing picture of hospitality! We have been hearing from Eva Wenzl and Simona Gallova. They’re connected with the Revive Our Hearts German team. And we’ve heard from the woman who hosted them when they were in need, Martha Jongewaard.

The Lord may have some divine appointments for you. Will you be ready? We would like to help you get ready and help you gain even more of a heart of hospitality.

So, we’d like to send you a new study from Revive Our Hearts. It’s called You’re Welcome Here. As you open God’s Word, you’ll learn that hospitality isn’t about cultivating the perfect surroundings, cuisine, and company. It’s a way to live in full surrender to Jesus. The study is perfect for personal or group study. You can even access some wonderful video content from Erin Davis and others to accompany each week’s lesson. 

We’ll send you a copy of You’re Welcome Here when you give a gift of any amount to Revive Our Hearts this month. It’s our way of saying “thank you” for your support of our mission—helping women thrive in Christ. 

To make a donation, just visit ReviveOurHearts.com, or call us at 1-800-569-5959. 

So, Jesus was always giving to others. He healed, He taught, and He . . . cooked?! Wouldn’t it be incredible to eat a meal that had been prepared by Jesus? We'll look at His hospitality 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.

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