Neighboring (Week 4)
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8 Let no debt remain outstanding, except the continuing debt to love one another, for whoever loves others has fulfilled the law.
9 The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery,” “You shall not murder,” “You shall not steal,” “You shall not covet,” and whatever other command there may be, are summed up in this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
These verses summarize what we have been talking about for the past few weeks. Jesus talked about loving God and loving our neighbor a lot.
There had been some notions swirling that the church was becoming inward focused, only about themselves. Paul wants to address that and says these words…If you are going to incur some debts let it be to love one another.
You all know the law, the laws that pertain to the sacredness of the family, the esteem we place on human life, and the recognition of the right to own property…get ahold of your desires and fulfill all of the law by doing this one things: Love your neighbor as yourself.
I think for some of us, loving our neighbor as we would like to be loved wouldn’t convey or communicate what we are really wanting to. I think in 2020, we could better understand these words as saying, “Love your neighbor as they want to be loved.” The same you want to people to love you the way that is meaningful and valuable to you…do the same for others. Find out what is meaningful and translates to love and do that to others.
Paul writes in Galatians 5:
14 For the entire law is fulfilled in keeping this one command: “Love your neighbor as yourself.”
We have been discussing this for the past few weeks because it is a tenant of our faith and should be central to our praxi (practice). Though it is commonly heard, maybe even said, far to often we see it pushed to the side, to the margins, even out of view for how we live our lives.
If we had an outside auditor survey our lives to evaluate how we are living our lives and examine if this was central to our practice we would probably be surprised by the outcome that we are not actually living for the glory of God and for the sake of our neighbor.
This series has been all about shifting our focus on this central tenant and how we live our lives. Hopefully we are seeing a shift back towards simply loving God and loving our neighbor.
We started out a few weeks ago talking about hospitality, and I hope that you have a different understanding of what that actually means. That it isn’t being a great southern host and cooking inspired meals while keeping a spotless house. Martha Stewart is not our ideal for Biblical Hospitality.
Biblical hospitality is so much more, thankfully, because I am not even good at the other stuff. If you thrive and knock it out of the park when it comes to housekeeping and cooking, more power to you. I cheer you on, but it doesn’t exclude the rest of us from being called to show true Biblical hospitality.
When we read the word ‘hospitality’ in the New Testament the word used is φιλοξενίαν (philozenia) — love for a stranger. The love of strangers is what the Scripture teaches us, but what we are taught is the ‘fear of strangers’, zenaphobia. We tell our kids, “Don’t talk to strangers.” “Stranger Danger!” Be careful who you make eye contact with; don’t talk to strangers even if they are offering you candy (especially if they are offering you candy).
What Jesus taught was a radically different moral code that this one. If you see a stranger go ‘unstranger’ them. Go fix it. Go befriend them.
All you need to turn a stranger into a friend is a welcome.
And all of us have a welcome. You can’t welcome people into my home or my space, but you can welcome them into yours.
Henry Nouwen
"In our world full of strangers, estranged from their own past, culture and country, from their neighbors, friends and family, from their deepest self and their God, we witness a painful search for a hospitable place where life can be lived without fear and where community can be found. Although many, we might say even most, strangers in this world become easily the victim of a fearful hostility, it is possible for men and women and obligatory for Christians to offer an open and hospitable space where strangers can cast off their strangeness and become our fellow human beings. The movement from hostility to hospitality is hard and full of difficulties. Our society seems to be increasingly full of fearful, defensive, aggressive people, anxiously clinging to their property and inclined to look at their surrounding world with suspicion, always expecting an enemy to suddenly appear, intrude and do harm. But still – that is our vocation: to convert the 'hostis' into a 'hospes', the enemy into a guest and to create the free and fearless space where brotherhood and sisterhood can be formed and fully experienced."
Yes, we are taught zenaphobia (to fear strangers) and possibly we are more divided than we have ever been, possibly it is more difficult to convert a stranger into a friend, there is more suspicion, more risks (physical, social, etc.), we have more reluctancies now than ever before in our lifetimes to converting a stranger into a friend, but the words of Henry Nouwen are still true...this is our vocation (our call, our mission) to convert the enemy into a guest, the stranger into a friend, the friend into family. Hospitality. This is our vocation.
Your motives will be questioned for everything you do, and listen to what the key is overcoming the suspicion we will all face in neighboring. The key to converting folks today from stranger into friend is sustained kindness. In a world full of suspicion, it will take continual proof that your love is real, is genuine to break through the barriers of 2020 and our cultural norms.
And given the world that we live in, why wouldn’t they be suspicious? Why would we love them? Because we live close to them? Because we walk by their house a lot? Your love for your neighbor will be met with suspicion, but the forerunner of our love will be sustained kindness.
Kindness will pave the way for love. With each act of kindness we are laying tracks, paving the way for love to be believed and accepted. Sustained acts of kindness is the tracks that love runs on.
I want to distinguish two ideas that often get muddled together.
Kindness vs. Goodness
Paul writes about both of these in speaking of the fruit of the Spirit. He lists both of them when talking about the work that God does in each one of us, and the fruit of the Spirits work in our hearts. It is visible, tangible, even palatable to those around us through the fruit of God’s Spirit.
Goodness: doing good deeds
Kindness: good deeds done strategically (with a purpose in mind)
serviceable, useful (goodness with a goal)
Goodness is a shotgun.
Kindness is a rifle.
Horse Power vs. Torque
Horse power and torque are two very similar ideas but very different. Torque is force to get something to move that doesn’t want to move on its own. (the nut…a bigger wrench)
Driving a nail: don’t force it just get a bigger hammer
Torque is measured in foot pounds, 1ft lever and put 1lb of pressure that will put 1ft/lb of torque.
Horse power = torque x RPM divided by 5,252
Determines how fast something can go once you get it going.
Horse power determines how fast it will go once it is going, but torque is what will get it going
Example: Potty Training Child/Opening the Jar in the Kitchen
Kindness is torque. (It moves people, even the seemingly immovable).
4 Or do you show contempt for the riches of his kindness, forbearance and patience, not realizing that God’s kindness is intended to lead you to repentance?
Those that seem to be immovable, the stuck, but kindness is what can move them.
Goodness is horse power.
Young Life: we have to earn the right to be heard.
If we are kind enough long enough then eventually we will earn a voice in their lives and when we do then we will tell them about Jesus.
The most staunch, the most determined, the most immovable, the most set in their ways…our best shot to show them Jesus isn’t to argue with them but to be kind to them.
Kindness is strategic, it is intentional, it is faithful, it is sustained, it is persistent…and it leads to repentance.
STORY: Rosaria Butterfield, The Gospel Comes with a House Key (why she is so passionate about this topic is because she was so diametrically opposed to Christianity)
“Going to dinner at the home of Christians was not high ...
They didn’t once flinch or scoff at her very fowl mouth. When they found out she was a vegan everyone at the house ate vegan. When they found out she was appalled at the overuse of power consumption then they turned off the HVAC and only ran fans when she was a guest. This was having over a course of years while her friends were opening mocking this family.
But they were incredibly accommodating, patient, kind, and charitable, and the result was that when they told her that they loved her in-spite of disagreeing on a number of things she actually believed them.
Was it not for kindness, sustained kindness, she never would have. It was kindness that allowed her to accept and believe their love for her. Ultimately, their kindness led to her repentance.
Theologian Miroslov Volf says, “Our society is marked by a persistent practice of exclusion.” But the way of Jesus is radically different. An actual Christian worldview sees FAMILY and those we would like to welcome into the family.
In summarizing all of the ministry of Jesus to one sentence it is said:
“God creating an environment of welcome to change the identity of outsiders to insiders.”
Joshua Jipp (Prof at Trinity Evang in IL), “Divine hospitality to the stranger and the sinner.”
Jesus didn’t even own a home and he was one of the most hospitable people to walk this earth.
CULTURAL CHRISTIANITY: Within Christianity, we tend to make heroes out of the upfront folks…those that have microphones, that sing, speak. What happens, whether intentional or not, is what becomes secondary is the service and hospitality that other offer behind the scene.
Jesus didn’t have a problem with preaching, but He was constantly hosting and making friends of strangers.
Paul...
30 For two whole years Paul stayed there in his own rented house and welcomed all who came to see him.
31 He proclaimed the kingdom of God and taught about the Lord Jesus Christ—with all boldness and without hindrance!
This is still our best way in a suspicious, hostile culture to see God’s Kingdom come to our communities. That we may offer kindness, sustained kindness, to lay the tracks for love to come in.
Hospitality. The love of strangers.
Allan Hirsch, “If every Christian family in the world simply offered good conversational hospitality around the table once a week to neighbors we could eat our way into the kingdom.”
Rosaria Butterfield, “Those that live out radically, ordinary hospitality see their homes not as theirs at all but as God’s gift to use for the furtherance of the Kingdom. They open doors, they seek out the underprivileged. They know that the Gospel comes with a house key.”
MUSIC
Henry Nouwen, “The movement from hostility to hospitality is hard and full of difficulties. Our society seems to be increasingly full of fearful, defensive, aggressive people, anxiously clinging to their property and inclined to look at their surrounding world with suspicion, always expecting an enemy to suddenly appear, intrude and do harm. But still – that is our vocation: to convert the 'hostis' into a 'hospes', the enemy into a guest and to create the free and fearless space where brotherhood and sisterhood can be formed and fully experienced."
Convert strangers and even enemies into friends and hopefully family.
It this really the whole entire thing? Do we, as Christians, really believe that it is all summed up in loving God and loving our neighbor? Does the way we live our life say that or just our mouth?
This is the summation of all that Jesus did. He came to make enemies and strangers friends and family. He came in Divine hospitality to welcome us as outsiders
6 When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners.
7 Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good.
8 But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.
9 And since we have been made right in God’s sight by the blood of Christ, he will certainly save us from God’s condemnation.
10 For since our friendship with God was restored by the death of his Son while we were still his enemies, we will certainly be saved through the life of his Son.
11 So now we can rejoice in our wonderful new relationship with God because our Lord Jesus Christ has made us friends of God.
PRAY