15 Qualities of Biblical Hospitality

We have great confusion amongst Christians when we talk about hospitality.  In America, the word hospitality is used interchangeably with the word entertaining.  When we delve into what the Bible teaches on the subject, it seems like there are some major differences between the two.  15 Qualities of Biblical Hospitality will clear up the confusion, friends.

For one thing, Biblical Hospitality is a Spiritual Discipline.  True Biblical Hospitality draws the focus off of us and onto our guests while entertaining is focused on us and how well we have prepared our food and home.  Entertaining is about our own talents and abilities.  There is a stark contrast between the two.

Biblical Hospitality is focused on food, home, and people just as entertaining is, however it gets our thoughts off ourselves and onto the needs of others.  It is a form of worship and when hospitality is entered into with the right heart it is freeing and allows faith to triumph over fear.

“Food cannot take care of spiritual, psychological, and emotional problems, but the feeling of being loved and cared for, the actual comfort of the beauty and flavor of food, the increase of blood sugar and physical well-being, help one to go on during the next hours better equipped to meet the problems ”

– Edith Schaeffer,  The Hidden Art of Homemaking

It is my opinion that Biblical Hospitality is dying here in the western world.  We must shift our focus off ourselves and back on Christ.  He is the only one who is able to supply us with what we need.   I have been privileged to participate in numerous short-term mission trips over the past decade and oddly enough it was on those trips to third-world countries that I experienced Biblical Hospitality for the first time.  You see it is simple… you offer whatever you have to whoever needs it.  You open your home and heart to a stranger. in need of a glass of water.   Give an encouraging smile and a good conversation to a lonely person.  You treat the members of your family with compassion and forgiveness.

For the record, I struggle with this high calling.  

It is with that in mind that I issue a challenge

to both you and me.

 Let’s bring back Biblical Hospitality

and change the world!

15 Qualities of Biblical Hospitality

• Christian Hospitality builds community.  (And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.  Hebrews 10: 24-25)
• Biblical Hospitality is a command.  ⁽Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.  Romans 12:13)
• Biblical Hospitality is a blessing.  (Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.  Hebrews 13:2)
• Biblical Hospitality enables us to care for the poor, the alien, and the needy.  (He said also to the man who had invited him, “When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,  and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”  Luke 14: 12-14)
• Christian Hospitality is a requirement for women.  (and having a reputation for good works: if she has brought up children, has shown hospitality, has washed the feet of the saints, has cared for the afflicted, and has devoted herself to every good work.  1 Timothy 5:10)
• Christian Hospitality is a requirement for men in leadership positions. (Therefore an overseer must be above reproach, the husband of one wife, sober-minded, self-controlled, respectable, hospitable, able to teach,  not a drunkard, not violent but gentle, not quarrelsome, not a lover of money. 1 Timothy 3:2-3)
• Biblical Hospitality develops spiritual gifts.  (Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.  As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen.  1 Peter 4:9-11)
• Biblical Hospitality is practiced with a cheerful heart.  (Show hospitality to one another without grumbling.  1 Peter 4:9)
•  Christian Hospitality is a hallmark of the early church.  (And every day, in the temple and from house to house, they did not cease teaching and preaching that Christ is Jesus.  Acts 5:42)
• Biblical Hospitality is love in action.  (Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.  Hebrews 13:1-2)
• Christian Hospitality advances the gospel by caring for missionaries.    (And remain in the same house, eating and drinking what they provide, for the laborer deserves his wages. Do not go from house to house.  Whenever you enter a town and they receive you, eat what is set before you.  Luke 10: 7-8)   
• Christian Hospitality is actively pursued.  (Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality.  Romans 12:13)
• Biblical Hospitality enables us to share the gospel message with our community, family, and friends.  ( And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them.  Luke 5:29)
• Biblical hospitality is “other” focused. (It was for the sake of the Name that they went out, receiving no help from the pagans.  We ought, therefore, to show hospitality to such people so that we may work together for the truth.  3 John 1: 7-8)
• Biblical Hospitality is costly.  (By this we know love, that he laid down his life for us, and we ought to lay down our lives for the brothers.  1 John 3:16)

Interested in learning more?  Check out these thought-provoking books.

L’Abri   by Edith Schaeffer

Open Heart, Open Home: The Hospitable Way to Make Others Feel Welcome & Wanted  by Karen Burton Mains 

GO DEEPER

YOUR TURN…

How do you display Biblical Hospitality in your life?  What are some tips that make this command easier for you to accomplish?

Blessings.

*This post may contain affiliate links.  Thank you for supporting The Peaceful Haven.