Room for the Stranger
Love Without Fences • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Reading from God’s Word:
Reading from God’s Word:
1 Let brotherly love continue.
2 Don’t neglect to show hospitality, for by doing this some have welcomed angels as guests without knowing it.
Introduction
Introduction
Last week I said that most of the good you’ll ever do won’t be planned. It shows up.
It comes to us through a phone call … or a name in the bulletin … or a conversation.
Good comes as a window that opens up in front of us — and very often we are tempted to let it close.
Last week we talked about how to resist that.
Have you ever been the new person?
Walk into a place where you know no one? Or, … very few?
Over the years, this has happened to my family as we’ve move to new congregations to work with.
There is always the first Sunday.
We walk inside … and everyone has a history … and we don’t.
They’ve done life together.
They know each other’s personalities and quirks. We didn’t.
They’ve attended each other’s family funerals and weddings.
They know who fixes the good food at the church potluck and whose to avoid. We didn’t.
They know whose pew is who’s … and several times found out the hard way.
They have established ways of doing things, you don’t know what they are, and then comes the awkward conversation, “we do don’t that here.”
Now, in my experience — most people have been kind — especially in those situations were we’re trying to look like we belong — but aren’t quite feeling it yet.
And I’ll tell you what really made the difference as I look back over the years.
Countless people that I can’t even remember now have walked up to me in those situations shook my had, and said “We’re glad you’re here.”
I couldn’t even tell you their name.
But in several situations I have had Christians come up to me and say:
“Come eat with us” and go to their home for an afternoon of fellowship …
I remember their names to this day.
Now this isn’t a criticism those who demonstrate kindness, but those who take the time to show you how much they care and get to know you, those are the ones you remember.
Now, at some point in life, everyone of us has been the stranger.
We all know what it’s like to be on the outside of a room where everyone else is on the inside.
Maybe you’ve been the new person at church.
Or, the new employee at work.
Or, you’ve moved to a new town, or found yourself in a marriage that put you in a family that already has its own language.
Some of you have experienced it in a hospital waiting room where everyone else seemed to know what to do.
Now, I want you to see what God does with this very common feeling and see how he builds a command on it.
He doesn’t ask us to imagine what the stranger feels — He wants us to remember.
Don’t neglect them he says in verse 1.
And it’s not that we went out and found them … they found us.
It’s a new neighbor 3 doors down.
It’s a new person where we work.
it’s a guest who walks in here for the rist time, sits by themselves, and tries to leave before anyone else can get to them.
They came with nothing but themselves, and the question is whether there is room.
You know God has a lot to say about this.
And the first time he spoke about it was a long time ago.
Let’s go to Leviticus 19. We’ll start there this morning and then turn our attention to Hebrews 13.
Israel Was Told to Remember
Israel Was Told to Remember
33 “When an alien resides with you in your land, you must not oppress him.
Let’s look at how God frames the command. Two parts. And the second part explains the first.
The first part is the rule.
Don’t oppress the stranger, 19:1.
Treat them like they were born here.
Love them like you would your fellow countryman.
The second part of v. 34 we really need to focus on.
34 You will regard the alien who resides with you as the native-born among you. You are to love him as yourself, for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.
You are to love him as yourself.
Now, look back at v. 18:
18 Do not take revenge or bear a grudge against members of your community, but love your neighbor as yourself; I am the Lord.
What do we know about this verse?
It’s what Jesus identifes as the 2nd greatest commandment, Matthew 22:39.
And now, here in Leviticus 19, God takes that exact phrase and applies it to someone from the outside.
Love him as yourself. What your neighbor gets, the stranger gets.
And note how he ties it all back to Egypt:
34 … for you were aliens in the land of Egypt; I am the Lord your God.
God doesn’t issue this command from the perspective of the stranger’s worth, or that he may be a good person, be useful, or become a citizen one day.
He grounds it in Israel’s memory.
They knew what it felt like to be strangers in a foreign land.
They felt what it was like to live for hundreds of years in a land where no one wanted them.
They had been the ones with the strong accent … the wrong religion, and no connections to anyone.
And .. so God is saying, when someone like that shows up in your town, you don’t have to imagine his life. You lived it.
Let’s go back to Exodus … where Moses says:
9 You must not oppress a resident alien; you yourselves know how it feels to be a resident alien because you were resident aliens in the land of Egypt.
You know how it feels … that’s the argument.
And then look at what God says about Himself in the book of Deuteronomy:
18 He executes justice for the fatherless and the widow, and loves the resident alien, giving him food and clothing.
19 You are also to love the resident alien, since you were resident aliens in the land of Egypt.
God loves the stranger.
He feeds him.
He clothes him.
And he instructs his people to do what He does.
So what do we see here? What does Leviticus instruct us before we move on to the NT?
Hospitality in the bible isn’t a personality trait.
It isn’t the gift a person has and the rest of us admire it from a distance.
It is a command.
It’s grounded in something everyone of us has.
We remember.
We know what it is like to be on the outside.
We know what it was to talk into a room where everyone else knows each other.
Some of you remember exactly what this felt like the first Sunday you walked in here.
The Church Has Inherited This Command
The Church Has Inherited This Command
Now, come to Hebrews 13.
The writer has just spent 2 chapters on the highest doctrine in the NT.
Christ is greater than the angels.
Christ is greater than Moses and greater than Aaron.
Jesus is the great High Priest who has passed through the heavens.
Jesus is the mediator of a better covenant.
And then chapter 13 opens, and the first 2 verses are about how you treat people.
Two Verses. Two commands. And sitting underneath all of it are two words built on the same foundation.
Let’s focus on the first one:
1 Let brotherly love continue.
Two Verses. Two commands. And sitting underneath all of it are two words built on the same foundation.
Brotherly love.
It’s the word philidelphia.
Love for God’s family.
Here we are told to let it continue.
Keep it going.
Keep doing what you’re doing.
Don’t let the pressure you’re facing cause you to turn inward and cold toward each other.
Now, v. 2:
2 Don’t neglect to show hospitality, for by doing this some have welcomed angels as guests without knowing it.
Hospitality.
Two words in the original:
philos — love
Xenos - the stranger, foreigner, or person on the outside.
The word “hospitality” here is describving the love of a stranger.
This is what God means by “hospitality.”
Not merely entertaining.
Not just having the people you already like over for supper.
Love for person you don’t know and owe nothing to.
So two commands:
Love your brother.
Love the stranger.
Both grow from the same source.
We can’t claim the first one and ignore the second.
Notice how he phrases the second command.
2 Don’t neglect to show hospitality, …
Don’t forget or let something slip by.
Now, most people don’t set out to be inhospitable.
It just doesn’t happen because we ‘re busy.
Or the house isn’t clean
Or because its awkward.
And note, Peter says it too:
9 Be hospitable to one another without complaining.
Paul says it too:
13 Share with the saints in their needs; pursue hospitality.
The word behind pursue is the word for hunting something down.
It’s the same word Paul used to describe himself when he spoke of his persecution of the church (Acts 26:11)
Chase it. Go after it.
Don’t wait for it to come to you.
Now, back to Hebrews. Notice how we have the reason for the pursuit:
2 …for by doing this some have welcomed angels as guests without knowing it.
He’s thinking of Abraham in Genesis 18.
3 men show up in the heat of the day. Abraham has no clue who they are.
He runs to meet them.
2 He looked up, and he saw three men standing near him. When he saw them, he ran from the entrance of the tent to meet them, bowed to the ground,
Look at v. 4-5:
4 Let a little water be brought, that you may wash your feet and rest yourselves under the tree.
5 I will bring a bit of bread so that you may strengthen yourselves. …
Three strangers treated like royalty. Look at v.6-8:
6 So Abraham hurried into the tent and said to Sarah, “Quick! Knead three measures of fine flour and make bread.”
7 Abraham ran to the herd and got a tender, choice calf. He gave it to a young man, who hurried to prepare it.
8 Then Abraham took curds and milk, as well as the calf that he had prepared, and set them before the men. He served them as they ate under the tree.
Here’s what Abraham didn’t know.
One of them is the Lord (18:10)
The other two are on their way to pull Lot and his family out of Sodom.
You know, if he had known who they were, it wouldn’t have been hospitality.
It would have been protocol.
He opens his tent to strangers … and they turn out to be far more than he could have ever guessed.
You never know who is at the door.
That’s not a threat … and it’s not a promise.
It’s just true.
You don’t know what the man 3 doors down is carrying, or what he’ll become, or what God is doing in his life that runs through your kitchen table.
You find that out by opening the door.
So, How Far Does it Go?
So, How Far Does it Go?
Now, for many of us, we’ve been very careful about what the local church does with the money it collects.
We have and are very committed to keeping this congregation doing the work Christ has given it to do and not drifting into anything else.
And all of that comes from a very good place.
And yes, every time the NT shows a collection going out for the needy, it’s going to needy saints.
In fact, Paul called it the ministry to the saints (2 Corinthians 8:4, 9:1).
So, that is a thing.
But here’s something I want us to consider:
Has our carefulness about what the church does quietly turned into carelessness about what we do?
Because even with the strictest reading of the text, the individual Christian is still commanded to do good to all.
And I wonder if our argument about the church’s money has impacted our thinking as individuals.
We’ve heard “the church doesn’t do that” so many times that somewhere along the line it’s become “I don’t do that” and never noticed.
Last Sunday, we were in Galatians 6:10.
10 Therefore, as we have opportunity, let us work for the good of all, especially for those who belong to the household of faith.
Note the word “especially” here.
It sets a priority.
Those in the brotherhood come first.
But, a priority isn’t a fence.
When you say you love your children especially, you haven’t said you love nobody else.
Paul says, for the good of all, and then he ranks the household first, inside of that all.
He doesn’t shrink it all down to the household.
And, if we want to press that Galatians 6:1-10 is talking just to the individual … that’s fine … then, it’s talking to you and to me.
Work for the good of all, it says.
And we need to do that. It needs to be a priority.
But, there is a passage I do want to place in front of us to just think about. This is 2 Corinthians, where Paul is talking about what will happen when the collection Paul has raised gets to Jerusalem:
13 Because of the proof provided by this ministry, they will glorify God for your obedient confession of the gospel of Christ, and for your generosity in sharing with them and with everyone.
Do you see it? with them … and with everyone.
Just let that last part of v. 13 sink into your mind.
Let it say what it says. Love doesn’t have fences.
Now, the Harder Part
Now, the Harder Part
Let’s look to something Jesus taught:
Leviticus was talking about the stranger who shows up and needs a place.
Hebrews was talking about the traveler at your door.
Those are sympathetic strangers.
Nobody's against them.
It's easy to preach about the widow and the refugee and the new family with the moving truck.
But: Jesus pushes past that.
44 But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,
Not the stranger who has no claim on you.
The one who has a grievance against you.
The one who's earned your coldness.
Jesus doesn’t stop here:
In fact, He says something that sounds like it was written for Hebrews 13.
47 And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what are you doing out of the ordinary? Don’t even the Gentiles do the same?
If the only people you make room for are the people who already belong to you, Jesus says the tax collectors can manage that.
There's nothing Christian about it. It's just what people do.
Loving the people who love you back is no achievement.
The love that marks you as God's child is the love that goes where it isn't owed.
What This Looks Like Tomorrow
What This Looks Like Tomorrow
Who's the stranger you already know about?
Who moved in this summer that nobody on the street has met?
Whose name do you not know at the shop you stop at three times a week?
Who sat alone this morning?
Who walked in that door, found a seat by themselves, and is going to walk back out in twenty minutes with nobody having said more than "good morning"?
Who eats lunch alone at work every day?
Who's the coworker everybody's a little tired of, and when's the last time anybody asked him a question about himself?
Who's the one you've been avoiding on purpose?
Most of what we’ve talked about today is not dramatic.
It's a name learned and remembered.
It's a Sunday lunch invitation to somebody you just met.
It's walking across the foyer instead of staying with your people.
It's a porch conversation that goes ten minutes longer than you meant it to.
It's the phone number you actually give instead of the one you say you'll give.
Listen to what Paul told Titus:
14 Let our people learn to devote themselves to good works for pressing needs, so that they will not be unfruitful.
Learn.
It's something we have to be taught.
Nobody's born hospitable.
Some people are born friendly, which isn't the same thing.
Hospitality is learned, and you learn it by doing it badly a few times until you get better.
And you already know how.
This congregation has never had trouble showing up when there's a truck to load.
You know what good looks like with work gloves on.
The question is whether it's an event or whether it's who you are.
Whether it stays on the sign-up sheet or whether it changes how you look at the man three doors down.
A congregation can do a great thing and go home.
Or a congregation can do a great thing and find out that's what it was for.
Look to Jesus
Look to Jesus
Everything I've asked of you this morning, the Lord did first, and He did it from the other side.
He was the stranger.
20 Jesus told him, “Foxes have dens, and birds of the sky have nests, but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head.”
He came into this world with no address.
11 He came to his own, and his own people did not receive him.
The people who should have made room for Him didn't. He spent three years being taken in by whoever would take Him in.
And when He wanted to tell us what the judgment would sound like, He put Himself in the stranger's place.
35 “ ‘For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat; I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink; I was a stranger and you took me in;
Not "you took in a stranger and I noticed."
You took me in.
The stranger at your door and the Lord at the judgment are closer together than you think.
There's a story in Luke 24 that reads like Hebrews 13:2.
Two disciples are walking to Emmaus on the Sunday afternoon after the crucifixion.
A stranger falls in beside them.
They don't recognize Him.
He walks with them seven miles, opens the Scriptures, and when they get to the village He acts like He's going on.
And they do the thing this sermon is about.
29 But they urged him, “Stay with us, because it’s almost evening, and now the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.
They invited a stranger in for the night.
And then this.
30 It was as he reclined at the table with them that he took the bread, blessed and broke it, and gave it to them.
31 Then their eyes were opened, and they recognized him, but he disappeared from their sight.
They welcomed a stranger without knowing it, and the stranger was the Lord.
They found out at the table.
They wouldn't have found out on the road.
It was the invitation that opened their eyes.
And finally, the deepest form of it.
Go back to where we started.
God told Israel to love the stranger because they'd been strangers in Egypt.
Paul says the same thing to the church, and the Egypt he's talking about is worse.
12 At that time you were without Christ, excluded from the citizenship of Israel, and foreigners to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in the world.
That was us. Foreigners. No covenant, no promise, no God. On the outside of everything that mattered.
And then:
19 So, then, you are no longer foreigners and strangers, but fellow citizens with the saints, and members of God’s household,
Somebody made room for you.
It cost Him a cross.
You didn't earn the seat and you couldn't have paid for it, and you were still a stranger when He pulled the chair out.
If that's what was done for us, then the question of whether the stranger deserves your table has already been answered.
It was answered about you, and the answer was no, (I didn’t deserve it) and He made room anyway.
As We Close…
As We Close…
Back to Hebrews 13:2 one more time.
2 Don’t neglect to show hospitality, for by doing this some have welcomed angels as guests without knowing it.
Some have. Past tense. It's already happened.
Abraham did it. Lot did it.
Two men on a road to Emmaus did it.
Somebody in this congregation may have done it and doesn't know it yet.
You never know who's standing at the door.
You don't know what God is doing in the life of the person you haven't met.
You don't know what a Sunday lunch will turn into, or what a learned name will mean to somebody who hasn't been called by it in months.
You find out by opening the door.
Israel was told to remember. So are we. You were the stranger once. Somebody made room. Go and do the same.
Invitation
Invitation
Now, very quickly:
If you are here today and without Christ, hear the way Ephesians 2 was written:
12 At that time you were without Christ, excluded from the citizenship of Israel, and foreigners to the covenants of promise, without hope and without God in the world.
That's the stranger's life, and it's not a way to live.
God has made room.
The door is Christ, and you walk through it the way everyone in the New Testament did, by obeying the Gospel.
You can stop being a stranger this morning.
Won’t you come?
