Hebrews 13:1-3

Today’s sermon slides will not be on the screen, but tap the phone tag and you can find sermon slides there. If you’re watching online, the slides are available through the link in the description.

Some of you attend our church exclusively online and due to some microphone issues, you missed last week. So I want us to begin by looking back on Hebrews 12:28 - “Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe,” Later in Hebrews 13, we’re going to read ‘sacrifice of praise’ and throughout this chapter, I plan on using offering and sacrifice interchangeably.

We’ve studied the cloud of witnesses. Worship like Abel. Walk like Enoch. Work like Noah. Witness like Abraham and the rest of them.

We’ve learned that indeed we are to run the race that has been set before us. We look to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith. We cherish the refinement of our life and look for the majesty and glory of Jesus Christ to be revealed in us and through us.

The last verses in chapter 12 invited us to plant the flag of our life at the hill of adoration rather than the hill obligation. Chapter 13 will walk through a list of relational offerings that lead to deeper worship of the Lord.

I invite you to explore and grow in these areas so you can worship, walk, work, and witness better in 2026.

Today’s relational offerings focus on relationships outside of your home

Hebrews 13:1–3 ESV

1 Let brotherly love continue. 2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares. 3 Remember those who are in prison, as though in prison with them, and those who are mistreated, since you also are in the body.

Right away, it is interesting to me the writer of Hebrews wrote to a group of Jewish Christians that struggled at figuring out how to be a church. We’ve seen some evidence of that in our study. If the author wanted them to comprehend what reverent, grateful, awe-filled, undelayed worship was, then it is fitting that Hebrews 13 would begin by focusing on loving, caring and serving people outside your home. Paul mentioned this throughout his epistles. James also mentioned it. Jesus lived it.

Jot down these references.

Romans 12:1 - “I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship.”

James 1:26–27 - “If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tongue but deceives his heart, this person’s religion is worthless. Religion that is pure and undefiled before God the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their affliction, and to keep oneself unstained from the world.”

1 John 2:6 - “whoever says he abides in Christ ought to walk in the same way in which he walked.”

Church, acceptable worship requires offerings and sacrifice. Acceptable worship requires a little inconvenience or disruption to our schedules. This topic is woven throughout the entire Bible. We will come to family relationships later in the chapter, but lets assume that having solid relationships with the people in your home is an essential base layers for the rest of the relationships in your life. If you struggle with your ‘four wall’ relationships, how are you going to get the “four corners” relationships right?”

Before we unpack these verses, I need to remind us there is a relationship pecking order in the Bible.

You and God. You and God and your spouse. You and God and your household. You and God and your local church. You and God and other Christians in your town. And according to Acts 1 it expands from there. The Bible is filled with investing in relationships outside your home. It’s important that we don’t skip parts of Scripture when they make us uncomfortable of distrupt our lifestyles.

The first relational offering - Deepen relationships inside your church family

Look at verse 1. Let brotherly love continue. Continue = abide. Brotherly love = phileo. Write this down - Let phileo abide. When I think of places in the New Testament that teach me about abiding, I go to John 15:5 - “I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing.”

In John 15, when a branch abides in the vine it a grafting process that becomes inseparable and bears much fruit. It is important for us to understand how a singular local congregation is meant to be grafted together so they abide and bear much fruit. Let me illustrate. When I was growing up we lived in a small house. The boys shared one bedroom. The girls shared the second bedroom. My parents were in the third bedroom. At one point, eight people lived in a 3-bedroom house. There were other families that lived in our town with the same last name. We were part of this larger extended family. However, I did different things with my brothers than I did with my cousins. We’re part of the same family. I love them. I enjoy them. I appreciate them. They matter to me. But they never knew what it was like to have 4 boys sharing one bedroom, because we’re not grafted together to abide. There has been long-lasting relational fruit from 4 boys sharing one small bedroom that was large enough for two set of bunk beds and a path to get to them.

Friends, don’t mistakenly give your spiritual cousins the grafted, abiding phileo that rightfully belongs to people in this room and then wonder why your life isn’t bearing much fruit.

Let phileo abides. When the Holy Spirit begins to convict so phileo abides as it should, somebody is going to get uncomfortable. The Holy Spirit will prompt you to lean into a relationship you might rather not lean into. The Holy Spirit is going to ask for time on your calendar. The Holy Spirit will poke and prod in your life, because the advancement of gospel need phileo to abide and bear much fruit in this church.

The second relational offering - Care for the Christian community outside your local church

Look at verse 2. The sentence structure of the Greek translated into raw English creates this choppy sentence, “Of hospitality, be not forgetful, through this for unknowingly some entertained angels.”

The entire verse might not make a ton of sense unless you know the historical context of hospitality in the Bible, so let’s look at the unchoppy part first. Write this down - Of hospitality, be not forgetful. In 2024, the hospitality industry generated 154 billion dollars. Hospitality in the Bible was very different. If you knew somebody, it was commonly accepted that you could show up unannounced and stay the night. When travellers arrived to an unfamiliar town, there were no hotels to enter and request a room. If there was a small inn, travellers would be very skeptical because innkeepers had horrible reputations like tax collectors. Most travellers would rather gamble asking a stranger for lodging or sleeping on a bench instead of looking for an inn.

When Jesus sent the disciples out in Mark 6, he instructed them about accepting hospitality. In Acts, we read about Peter staying in somebody’s home. Paul frequently wrote about being a guest in various homes. There were many others that would travel for ministry purposes that needed food and shelter. There was a world-wide open door policy among the Jewish population and the Christian church.

Early church historians tell us persecution was another reason why Christians would travel and need hospitality. Often, their next meal or glass of water or dry blanket came because another Christian cared for them. They had a place to sleep only because another Christian generously opened their home, often with the host going without something. In 2006, I was deep in Mexico. We decided to stay with families connected to the church we were serving that week. We walked into the house and brought me to the master bedroom. The culture insisted that guests receive the finest and the best, even if that meant the host family went without something. We stayed five days, but the general accepted practice in the New Testament was a one-night stay. A two-night stay was acceptable under certain conditions. Hospitality was a high risk offering for the host.

The writer of Hebrews tells us high risk is not an adequate reason to overlook actively caring for Christians that live outside your home. Don’t forget to do it. Don’t neglect it. Don’t overlook your responsibility to be with other Christians and care in appropriate ways. True hospitality involves some risk. Broken dishes can be replaced. Spilled drinks can be cleaned up. Conversations with awkward moments of silence are trophies. Keep hospitality at the center of your brain. Put extra food in your crockpot for Sunday lunch. Carry an extra gift card in case your prompted to give it away. But, never think writing a check or making a donation fulfills caring hospitality.

The rest of verse 2 reminds us that angels have made appearances without humans knowing and we will save that for Wednesday night.

Of hospitality, be not forgetful.

The third relational offering - Serve other Christians who physically or emotionally cannot meet their own needs

Look at verse 3. The context focuses on Christians who are mistreated, tormented or unable to defend themselves due to the actions of other people. The context is not talking about lazy people or people who have played stupid games and won stupid prizes. This verse isn’t even addressing aging people who have stopped doing things. While all of those things good conversations to have, verse 3 reminds to serve those inside the body of Christ that are physically and emotionally struggling through life due to the actions of other people. There is plenty of history that shows Christians are unjustly arrested and placed in prison.

Last year, 4700 Christians were arrested and detained for religious reasons alone.

On September 9, 2025, The Michigan Senate Resolution No. 65 stated - “The overall food insecurity rate in Michigan stands at 14.2% with childhood food insecurity exceeding 19% statewide.” Of the 244 students at Sutton Elementary, 46 of them do not have enough food. Imagine the heartache of the Christian teachers in that building. Imagine the compassion that would like to be given.

It’s why I dream of laundry facilities inside church buildings. It’s why we partner with CPC of Lenawee and Neighbors of Hope. It’s why our Cooperative Program giving is extremely important. Through these partnerships, people are empowered to care for the mistreated, the tormented, and those unable to defend themselves. Is it enough? Probably not, but I will allow you and the Holy Spirit to have that conversation.

Chris, that’s a large problem. What can I do? You could make a difference in one life if you offered one hour of screen time each week to serve another person. Partnering with this demographic of people in our county is sweat equity that will disrupt your calendar and might make you uncomfortable, but it will also bear much fruit.

I want to conclude with the words of Philosopher Bertrand Russel. He wrote an essay entitled, “Why I Am Not a Christian.” The purpose of this article was to present what he believed were irrefutable arguments against Christianity.

He wrote this, “I think there are many good points upon which I agree with Christ a great deal more than many professing Christians. I do not know that I can go all the way with Him, but I could go with Him much farther than most professing Christians can.”

Church, as an offering of worship, we have a responsibility to run the race that is set before us for the glory of God and to keep bad examples at a minimum.