20170309 Hospitality – building deeper community

Gathering together to eat food is a very basic human activity. In all corners of the globe, at any level of society, the taking in of food is most commonly done with others. There are rules and customs established to manage a sense of order around meals – the planned preparation and consuming of food. People make a lot of money out of food – it’s an ever expanding industry. The actual growing of food, the harvesting, the processing – there are so many different points in the process of creating a meal that you eat. Do you prepare the meal, or do you pay someone else to do it? Do you have it at home, or do you go out to have it? So many decisions, so many variables.

There are many Biblical references to food, many of them contextual in the Old Testament, needing to be interpreted through a lens of New Testament teaching in the light of the coming of Jesus.

However, the Bible’s teaching on hospitality is very consistent – we as God’s people should do it, not for personal gain but for the benefit of those whom we serve through it.

The hospitable act of the communal meal possesses great symbolic significance. In the ancient world, to share food with someone was to share life. Such a gesture of intimacy created a bond of fellowship. Hence, God’s meal with the elders of Israel (Exodus 24:1-11), Jesus’ meals with tax collectors and sinners (eg Luke 11:37), the Lord’s Supper (Mark 14:17-26), Jesus’ post-resurrection meals (eg Luke 24:30-31), Peter’s meal with Gentiles (Acts 10:48-11:3), and the common meal of the early Christians (Acts 2:42-47) communicated a powerful message of intimacy and unity.

Come join us in this hospitable act of the Friends of Donvale next week. Maybe it will be a prompt to us to get back into the swing of exercising greater hospitality in our own family’s life. Hospitality brings blessing to all, it reminds us in deep ways about the blessings of community and it allows us to serve one another in love. Now that’s a great thing to refocus our energies towards – all the while, sharing in beautiful food and deep fellowship. “I’ll have some of that!”