Mother's Day: Hospitality and the Heart of a Mother

I. Introduction
A. This morning we begin a three week series on hospitality.
B. And since it’s Mothers Day we’re going to get started by looking at a passage which points us to mothers as an example for the proper spirit of hospitality: 1Thessalonians 2:1-12.
C. Let me give you a little background to this passage.
1. In Paul’s second missionary journey, God called him through a dream to sail to the Greek peninsula and proclaim the gospel there. First he did so at Philippi, where he and Silas were thrown into prison. (Acts 16)
2. They then traveled down the road to the city of Thessalonica and began to spread the gospel there. After only perhaps a few weeks, and many converts, some stirred up trouble against Paul and Silas and they had to flee for their lives and move on to the next city.
3. But the enemies of the gospel in Thessalonica did not stop there. They began a propaganda campaign against the gospel by trying to poison the new converts toward Paul and Silas through a program of disinformation, especially about their motives.
4. So within weeks after leaving Thessalonica, Paul writes this letter to attempt to set the record straight.
D. Read 1Thessalonians 2:1-12
II. Explanation of hospitality
A. The NT epistles make a pretty big deal about hospitality:
1. Romans 12:13 “Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.”
2. 1Peter 4:9 “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.”
3. 1Timothy 3:2 “An overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach.” Cf. 1Timothy 5:10
4. Hebrews 13:2 “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.”
B. The Oxford dictionary defines hospitality as the friendly and generous treatment of guests or strangers.
1. This implies a context where one person is in some sense at home and another is not.
2. It doesn’t necessarily refer to something which happens in your house, but anywhere you are at home and some others are not: e.g. church, town, country, dorm room, workplace, school.
C. God’s umbrella command to us is to love, but here we’re told not so much about how to love as where to love: when you’re on your home turf, make sure to love those who are not on their home turf.
D. What hospitality means in English and in Greek
1. Five of the seven times you read the word hospitality in your Bible, the Greek word being translated is a compound word made of two other words: PHILEO (the word for love — it’s where we get our word philanthropy [love of mankind] and philosophy [love of wisdom]) and XENOS (which means stranger, foreigner — it’s where we get our word xenophobia [fear of foreigners]).
2. One of the other two is translated from another compound word made of the word for stranger and the word for receive: receiving strangers.
3. Actually the English word hospitable is very similar. It comes from the word for stranger as well, referring to proper treatment of strangers. (That’s why the word HOST and the word HOSTILE have the same derivation.)
III. Explanation of 1Thessalonians 2:1-12
A. 7 “But we were gentle among you, like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.”
1. There is a textual issue here and some disagreement whether the word for GENTLE or the word for INFANTS was in Paul’s original epistle, so the Bible might actual say, “But we were infants among you” here.
2. But I’d like to focus on the second half of the verse: “like a nursing mother taking care of her own children.”
3. The Greek word translated “taking care of”connects emotional caring (e.g. “I care about you”) with physical care (e.g. “I am caring for you”), similar to the English word “care.” It implies both.
4. God says to love your neighbor as yourself: don’t just love yourself, love others in the same kind of way you love yourself.
a. A mother loving her infant is perhaps the most natural form of this. This little one who was very recently still a part of you has now become a distinct person. And it is perhaps the most common love in all human experience, when a momma looks down at her baby and cherishes and cares for that little child.
b. In some cases it’s the transforming experience which turns a woman outward: There’s a girl who has been something of a princess her whole life, and now suddenly there’s this OTHER, there’s this very prominent SOMEONE ELSE. And the self-absorbed girl becomes a loving, caring, mothering woman.
c. It’s almost as if a mother can’t help but love her baby.
d. She is loving this new person — this new neighbor — as herself.
5. The parent-child bond is very strong. When you first enter into a relationship with the one you marry, generally the thing you most appreciate about them is their love for you.
a. And that was certainly true for me. However, after we had children, the thing I appreciate most about my wife is her love for our children. That’s more important to me — because I love them so much, I treasure the love my wife has for them. I’d rather she be hard toward me and loving toward them than loving toward me and hard toward them.
6. And so Paul here uses the attitude of a nursing mother taking care of her baby as an illustration for the manner with which he cared for the Thessalonians, even though he had just met them.
B. He goes on in v.8 “So, being affectionately desirous of you, we were ready to share with you not only the gospel of God but also our own selves, because you had become very dear to us.”
1. Opening your heart to others is a dangerous business. You risk possible rejection and insult, which are much more painful when you’ve opened your heart to another.
2. What could motivate someone to share themselves with others in this way? Only love drives a person to be willing to take the risk.
C. It’s very easy to see yourself in your children in the sense that you love them as yourself because they are an extension of you.
1. But then the call of God comes and says “I want you to treat strangers with this same loving spirit. I want you to treat the outsider as if he’s one of you. I want you to treat the guest as if he’s part of the family. I want you to widen the circle of your love to include others which I bring to the doorstep of your life.
2. “I want you to have the same sympathy, the same heart, the same fondness for others as a nursing mother has for her baby.”
IV. Application
A. Now someone might respond to this by saying that this is Paul’s description of himself, it’s not a command to all believers. But I would have to say no. By divine inspiration Paul commanded us to imitate him: 1Cor.4:16, 11:1; Phil.3:17, 4:9; 2Thes.3:9.
1. So Paul’s example here is God’s command to us.
B. The gospel is not just a body of information, it is a lifestyle, a lifestyle which includes hospitality, a lifestyle which can be seen in the apostle Paul and his heart for those Christ loved in places like Thessalonica.
1. This lifestyle includes a spirit of gentle, affectionate caring for others, being other-centered, being willing to take responsibility for others.
C. Love is a heart disposition, whereas hospitality is an action, a lifestyle, that flows from a heart of love.
1. So before you can practice hospitality, you have to have hospitality in your heart.
2. You have to think of others as part of you.
3. You have to believe that others are a part of you, that we are all in this together.
4. You have to see that they are God’s precious creatures made in His image.
D. The good news we read in the Bible is that when we were outsiders, when we were strangers, even when we were enemies, Christ welcomed us into His family, dying on the cross to put to death our alienation from Him.
1. He opened His heart big enough to include even little old you and me sinners in this far-off corner of the world.
2. Not only did He allow us to come for a visit, but He took us in as His adopted children and made us part of His family.
E. And the first duty of any person is to receive this One who receives sinners, to welcome Jesus into the home of his/her heart, this One who “has no place to lay His head” (Matt.8:20), this One who “He came to His own, but His own did not receive Him.” John 1:11.
1. Will you receive Him this morning? He’s at the door knocking, you know (Rev.3:20).
2. Will you open the door and welcome Him into your life?
3. Will He find a place to stay in your heart?
4. Let every heart prepare Him room!
F. But once we have received Him, in His call to be hospitable He asks us to receive others in His name and welcome them into our lives and into His family.