40acts: Ready to ActSample

Act 4: Meet Up

Once you start opening your heart and hands to the needs of others around you, you’ll find you want to open your home, too. Invite people to get together, either at your house or elsewhere. Use it as a chance to pray for each other or just a chance to be hospitable.

The invitation to a life of truly generous hospitality runs like a thread through the whole Bible. In Leviticus, God commanded his people to welcome the foreigner. Because of his command, they couldn’t ignore those on the outside – kindness was a behaviour they had to adopt, a habit they had to act out. 

But what God had to command in the Old Testament is no longer an alien practice for us. Through Christ, it is now a reality that lives in our hearts. God’s people once needed His command to ‘love the foreigner as themselves’ – it would have felt unusual and awkward. But now, according to Philippians, that mind that looks outwards to the interests of others is yours in Jesus. ‘Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus’ (Philippians 2:3–5). He doesn’t have to deliver commands. His heart lives in yours. It comes with the package and it just is who you are. 

So, what would it look like to have a whole community who looked like Jesus in His hospitality, welcoming to everyone? Not just superficially nice, but deeply kind in their welcome? Philippians says it is in your very nature as someone united with Christ to do the things He did and value the people He did. You can welcome like Jesus welcomed, whether you have a home to invite people to, or not.