Welcoming Strangers: Church Revitalization Through the Practice of Biblical Hospitality Toward Strangers
*This article was previously published in The Journal of Asian Mission
Welcoming Strangers: Church Revitalization through the Practice of Biblical Hospitality Toward Strangers
Dr. Craig C. Kraft
January 2020
Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Today as I write, protests and demonstrations are taking place in major cities around the world to draw attention to the ongoing racial disparity and discrimination that persists in modern societies around the world. Despite the efforts of great leaders, the writing of new laws, and the efforts of our education systems, there seems to be natural angst within us toward people who are different. Xenophobia (Gk. the fear of strangers or foreigners) has existed since the earliest days of humanity. In Genesis 4, after Cain murdered his brother, his sin and broken relationship resulted in God sending him away from his family. We read immediately of Cain’s fear, “Behold, you have driven me today away from the ground, and from your face, I shall be hidden. I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will kill me” (Gen. 4:14 ESV).
The antithesis of xenophobia is philoxenia (Gk. friendship toward strangers or foreigners); this is the Greek word translated in Scripture as hospitality. The biblical model of hospitality goes far beyond warm greetings and entertaining of friends and family. It is the demonstration of brotherly love (phileo) toward strangers (xenos), as we see in the story of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37).
Hospitality is a powerful practice, with the potential to bring restoration and revitalization to souls in need. It is a virtue, espoused in Scripture, through God’s earliest interactions with the patriarchs right through the teachings of Jesus and the Apostles. Often misunderstood in our modern context, hospitality rediscovered allows hosts and guests to experience a taste of God’s love and grace through their interactions with each other.
A Biblical Theology of Hospitality
The Bible is full of hospitality -- from the provision of clothing for Adam and Eve in Genesis to the final Marriage Supper of the Lamb in Revelation, one cannot study Scripture without encountering themes, stories, and teaching on hospitality. The biblical understanding of hospitality is the demonstration of love for strangers, as illustrated in the Luke 10 story of the Good Samaritan. It is a spiritual discipline found all through the pages of Scripture. Christine Pohl writes, “Hospitality is central to the meaning of the gospel… and a practice by which we can welcome Jesus” (Pohl 1999). Amy Oden adds, “The astounding range and depth of the evidence tells us that hospitality as a practice and as a virtue held a central place in the early Christian life. Indeed, there is hardly a place we can look where we will not see traces of it” (Oden 2001). When Christians practice the command to love one another, they are reflecting the hospitality of God.
The Old Testament is a story of God’s hospitality toward the people He has chosen to make a nation. When God delivers the Hebrews from slavery in Egypt, He reminds them that they are pilgrims and strangers in a land that belongs to Him. They are told of His hospitality and commanded to show the same hospitality toward others (Leviticus 19:33-34, Numbers 9:14). By the end of the Old Testament, hospitality toward a stranger is expanded to include widows, orphans, the poor, and even the physically disabled. In the closing book of the Old Testament, we receive a warning that those who fail to care for the widows and fatherless, and those who deprive the sojourners, will be judged severely by God (Malachi 3:1-5). This sets the stage well for the ultimate act of hospitality in the New Testament. God sends His son to dwell among men as a sojourner, to offer reconciliation and adoption as sons into the family of God. A story that started with God creating a perfect garden for Adam and Eve will culminate in that same God creating a new home for His family with Him in a new holy city.
The New Testament is also ripe with hospitality. Jipp sees hospitality as more than just a spiritual discipline but as “the heart of the Christian faith” (Jipp 2017: 7). Sutherland defines hospitality in this way:
In the light of Jesus’ life, death, resurrection, and return, Christian hospitality is the intentional, responsible, and caring act of welcoming or visiting, in either public or private places, those who are strangers, enemies, or distressed, without regard for reciprocation (Sutherland 2006: xiii).
Willis and Clements write:
Any time we practice hospitality, we put human flesh on this gospel story. The apostle Paul made this idea clear when he wrote, “Welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you, for the glory of God” (Rom. 15:7) (Willis & Clements 2017: 41-42).
It is difficult to find a page in the New Testament, where we do not see hospitality. Commands to love one another permeate the Gospels, and we learn that being a good neighbor to those living among and around us is what it means to be the people of God. Hospitality instructions reach their climax in Matthew 25:31-46 when we see the Son of Man sitting in judgment over the world. Jesus gathers the nations and separates them like a shepherd would separate sheep and goats. On one side are those who have fed the hungry and thirsty, welcomed strangers, clothed the naked, and visited the sick and imprisoned. They are blessed and will inherit the kingdom. Separated from the blessed will be those who did not show hospitality to the hungry, strangers, naked, sick, or imprisoned, and they are sent away to eternal punishment.
Judgment in this passage is based on whether the people have shown hospitality or not. There is no mention of confession of sin, acknowledgment of Christ, or any other formulas of faith or obedience. It is a pure judgment based on one’s hospitality toward “one of the least of these my brothers” (Mt. 25:40). In many ways, this passage calls the reader back to the narratives in Genesis 18 and 19, where God blesses Abraham and curses Sodom for their abundance or lack of hospitality.
It is evident here, and in many other passages, that hospitality is a central theme in Scripture. When we extend love to strangers, we are living out the mission of God in our context. Hospitality is modeled by God, personified in Christ, and expected of His followers. The story of the Good Samaritan effectively illustrates biblical Hospitality. Love your neighbor, even if he or she is a stranger.[1] In this way, followers of Jesus reflect the hospitality of God toward those who were once strangers but are now children and heirs of God, and citizens of heaven. Park asserts, “Hospitality to the stranger, particularly to the marginalized of society, is then both intrinsic to the gospel and crucial to its proclamation” (Park 2002: 387). Carroll goes so far as to say that failure to practice hospitality toward strangers might be a “rebellion against God” (Carroll 2020: 54).
Research Methodology
I recently completed a grounded research project examining the hospitality of Canadian evangelical churches toward Syrian refugees. While this study was local and specific, many of the observations are transferable to other contexts.
Canada is a nation of immigrants. Apart from our indigenous, “First Nations,” people, all our Canadian ancestors were immigrants from somewhere, and the trend continues. Statistics Canada states that 313,580 immigrants arrived in Canada in 2019, making up eighty-two percent of the nation’s growth (Government of Canada— Canada’s Population Estimates: Age and Sex, July 1, 2019). In the last five years, over 64,000 Syrians have arrived in Canada. Many of these Syrians have come as refugees, and Canadian churches have sponsored some of these refugees.
The purpose of my research was to examine the interactions between Christians and Syrian refugees in Canada to demonstrate the influence of practicing Christian hospitality on the spiritual maturity and vitality of Canadian Christian hosts.
My research focused on a survey of one hundred and seventy-six evangelical churches and narrative interviews with twenty-two individuals representing eighteen congregations from eleven denominations. I wanted to observe how churches were practicing hospitality toward Syrians and identify what impact this was having on their congregations. My conclusion: churches that practice a biblical model of hospitality are more likely to be demonstrating other characteristics of church health and spiritual vitality than churches that do not practice hospitality.[2] I believe that the practice of biblically informed hospitality can have a revitalizing impact on a local church.
Observable Impact of Hospitality in Canadian Churches
I was drawn to this research idea after watching a YouTube interview with Harold and Shirley Lutzer. Harold and Shirley are from Regina, and they shared how they were angered when they first learned of all the Syrian refugees who were being admitted into Canada. They felt that this would be bad for Canada. Still, after praying about it, they started to study about the Syrian diaspora and develop connections with some of the Syrians arriving in their community. Their hearts were dramatically changed. Their connections grew into deeper friendships and opportunities for them to share the gospel and invite the new arrivals to visit their church (Lutzer 2017). Their short testimony told an insightful story of how they attributed meaning to their actions (Symbolic Interaction). They understood their acts of hospitality (prayer, meals, ESL, events) to be an extension of their mission as Christians and as a practical expression of what it means to love our neighbors. They said that showing unconditional love to the immigrants was an expression of the love of Jesus. Shirley concluded, “God is sending the mission field to us; we must love them.” They see their love for the Syrians as an expression of the mission of God.
Over two years later, while working on the conclusions of this research project, I came across a similar story from Faith Fellowship Baptist Church in Vancouver, which started serving meals and providing housing for refugees in 2004. Since then, they have welcomed more than 600 refugees from 60 countries. Pastor Taylor states that serving refugees has changed their congregation.
“It changed the way we prayed, the way we raised resources, even how we did baby showers. It changed our senior’s meetings because the refugees adopted our senior ladies as their Canadian mothers, who, in turn, adopted refugee women as their daughters. It changed the whole dynamics of how church functioned” (Taylor 2020: 16).
The experience of the Lutzers and this Vancouver church are consistent with what I repeatedly heard in my interviews with Canadian pastors. Every church in my sample spoke about how their interactions with refugees had changed them. Most of their observations fell withing four categories: transformed attitudes, expanded relationships, spiritual development, and missional focus.
Transformed Attitudes and Perceptions
Many interviewed hosts spoke of fears or concerns when they first heard about the Syrian Muslims who were coming to Canada. They also shared how those fears were mitigated through their interactions with the Syrian people. God was clear about His expectations for the people of Israel. “When a stranger sojourns with you in your land, you shall not do him wrong. You shall treat the stranger who sojourns with you as the native among you, and you shall love him as yourself, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt: I am the Lord your God” (Lev. 19:33-34). In the New Testament, Jesus commands us to “Make disciples of all nations” (Mt. 28:18), and the author of Hebrews writes: “Let brotherly love continue. Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares” (Heb. 13:1).
I found that when Christians engage with immigrants, they experience a transformed attitude toward people who are different. As we saw above, friendship replaced fear. This reflects a biblical perspective regarding strangers.
Christ’s command to love your neighbor has never been diminished. Followers of Christ today are still bound by God’s law to treat immigrants as they would treat any of their other neighbors. If there were any doubt about this, one would need to look no further than Jesus’ instructions in Luke 10: 25-37, where He instructs the young lawyer to love his neighbor. This is how the church should be living as sojourners in this place. Followers of Christ should be missional instruments of God’s love. They should provide an open invitation for the nations to join in their worship of God and should be helping the world see who God is and what He has done for them. Believers should invite the sojourners among them to have the opportunity to consecrate themselves before God and celebrate His provision and grace for them.
Peter recognizes the transient nature of the Christian’s existence in this world and reminds us that this is not where our permanent citizenship is (1 Peter 2:9-12). The context of this passage is Paul calling the church to holiness as the people of God. Peter contrasts the church with the world in verse nine by reflecting on the fulfillment of Exodus 19:3-6, stating: “But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession…” In verse eleven, he adds, “Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles.” The Greek words here are paroikous and parepidamous. These refer to the sojourner and the one who sojourns in a strange place.
Peter’s epistle begins with an explanation of the privilege of being a Christian. He uses parepidamous twice in the first chapter to emphasize that believers are strangers or exiles in this world. It is not their permanent home. Identification as exiles ties the community of Christ back to the sojourning nature of God’s people in the Old Testament. Also, in verse eleven, Peter redirects his attention to the practical side of living out their faith. He introduces this second section of his epistle by urging the church to continue to live as sojourners and exiles. Part of the faith journey is to live as paroikos. The church is to maintain their distinction from the pagans. They are called to live differently so that they will be noticeable. “Keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation” (v.12). Peter reminds his readers that at one time, they were not people with an identity. They were sojourners, but now they are an identified group of people -- the people of God (v.10). Those who have been “born again,” as described in chapter one, are now people of God, no longer strangers and aliens, but part of His holy nation. However, we who were once spiritual sojourners are now to continue to live as aliens in this secular world. This world is not the real home for the Christian. A Christian’s real home and identity are in the holy nation of God. As a citizen of another kingdom, the life of a believer should be visibly different from the citizens of this world, so that good deeds and holiness will stand out. One of the principal ways that the church lives out this holiness is through the practice of loving hospitality toward strangers, sojourners, refugees, outcasts, widows, orphans, prisoners, and others who are marginalized and in need. I found that the Christian hosts who were engaged in hospitality had a growing awareness and alignment with God’s perspective of all humankind as strangers in this world.
Relationships and Resources
In addition to the transformed attitudes and perspectives outlined above, I have observed that practicing hospitality leads to the expansion of relationships and partnerships outside of the local church, resulting in the development of more significant unity among Christians.
The research identified five different types of partnerships: partnerships with denominations and sponsorship agreement holders, with other churches in the community, with missionaries, with the Muslim community, and with other resource providers. Concerning building unity among Christians, I found that by partnering with other churches and missionaries, the churches were, in fact, building unity in the Body of Christ.
When asked if their church was more or less healthy as a congregation as a result of their ministry with Syrian immigrants, six churches described the health of their church, in part, by indicating new partnerships with others. They drew attention to how working with the Syrians provided an opportunity to develop partnerships with others. Several churches in the city of Hamilton have partnered together to help sponsor additional refugees and provide refugee resources in their community. A church in British Colombia developed a partnership with other churches in the city to reach out to the local Muslim community and provide sponsorship to additional Syrian families. I found that refugee sponsorship often created the need for partnerships, which, in turn, led to new levels of cooperation and unity between local Christian congregations.
Sponsoring a refugee family is a challenging undertaking. Many smaller churches lack the resources to sponsor on their own. Two of the churches interviewed relied on local partnerships for finances and other resources to participate in sponsoring. Both of these small churches in the city of Vancouver were able to join in sponsoring partnerships where they worked together to secure finances and other material resources to host a refugee family. The partnerships also provided shared resources and people to engage with the Syrian family through the year-long commitment. One of these churches shared that their first experience was very positive, and they were able to sponsor more families in the following years. This is a great example of the Body of Christ being unified through hospitality. None of these small congregations from different denominations could sponsor a family on their own. Still, their desire to host Syrian families provided the opportunity to come together around a common purpose.
Another area where significant partnership development occurred was evident in the relationship between some of the churches and their missionaries. In some instances, missionaries serving in the Middle East were proactively engaged in helping their denomination and individual churches to connect with families in refugee camps. These missionaries helped to establish communication between the family and sponsoring church during the lengthy application period. These church-missionary partnerships provided strategic assistance to the church in developing relationships with the families hosted and coaching for effective resettlement.
Several of the churches interviewed also identified partnerships with local missionaries who were retired or on a home assignment. These missionaries provided significant assistance to churches in the hosting of Syrian families. Professionals, with cross-cultural experience and language skills, were able to coach congregations in their interactions with their Syrian guests. Pastors indicated that these local missionaries were a vital part of their successful cooperation with the Syrians and that it enhanced their experience as hosts.
Engaging in hospitality with Syrians enhanced existing partnerships between churches. It led to new partnership development with churches, organizations, and missionaries, providing opportunities to build collaboration, cooperation, and unity among Canadian believers.
A Spiritual Discipline
My research found that the practice of biblical hospitality was accompanied by spiritual renewal. Interviews noted that biblical hospitality is seen as an act of obedience to God, which was usually accompanied by a sense of joy and fulfillment. If we agree that spiritual vitality may be measured by the presence of spiritual fruit, then it was evident from my interviews that the hosting churches in the study were experiencing spiritual vitality. Ninety-three percent of the churches interviewed indicated that they felt spiritually healthier as a result of their interactions with Syrian immigrants. They described their interactions with words and phrases that highlighted the presence of spiritual fruit, particularly love and kindness. Interviews indicated that individuals associated their acts of hospitality to a greater appreciation of God and His love for people. One woman stated, “It adds to our overall sense of God’s hospitality, talking to people who are different from you, and hearing their stories. I think it just encourages people to keep fostering that.” I found that churches engaged in acts of hospitality toward Syrians, or other marginalized individuals, are likely to experience a realignment of some of their views and the recognition of spiritual fruit, both personally and corporately.
Ott and Téllez suspect that increased interactions with immigrants in America lead to a change in personal views toward immigrants and a closer alignment of the evangelical’s personal views and practices to evangelical theological convictions (2019:265). Interviews with Canadian evangelicals affirm their suspicion. Several of the interviewed hosts described spiritual reformation as part of their experience when describing the hosting of Syrian refugees.
The research also found that hospitality led to a personal renewal in the individuals interviewed. Six of the individuals interviewed spoke of how they have become more welcoming of all immigrants because of their experiences with extending hospitality toward the Syrians. Several indicated that their interactions with the Syrians had changed their views and perceptions about Muslim immigrants in general and the Syrian people in particular. “We have lost our fear of Muslims. We have learned to love them.” Interviews also indicated that people who created space in their lives to include interaction with strangers (Syrians) also experienced a renewed sense of spiritual vitality. They described their renewed vitality with enthusiasm: “It’s been energizing for the church… I see people who didn’t know that this was their calling or even their passion. They got involved, and for these people, it has been so life-giving.”
The findings from the interviews indicated a renewal of the attitudes and spiritual practices of Canadian evangelical hosts. Eighty-eight percent of the interviewed hosts spoke of their love for the Syrian people. Seventy-six percent indicated they saw their interactions with Syrians as a direct expression of their commitment to missions.
At a time when North Americans are being torn apart by the history and persistence of racism, my research demonstrates that the practice of biblical hospitality is an effective way to build intercultural bridges. Engaging and building relationships with “strangers” removes the strangeness and allows the host and guest to relate to one another as friends.
Glocal Mission Opportunities
An African proverb states: “Western society has the watch and the clock, but Africans have the time.”[3] The proverb refers to Western society’s preoccupation with time, schedules, and calendars, while Africans are more concerned with people and relationships.
The practice of biblical hospitality focuses on relationships and the pursuit of seeing people as God sees them. Loving strangers and engaging with them as God mandates is participation in the mission of God. Evangelical Christians and the church have been criticized as being largely irrelevant to their cultural contexts (Roxburogh, 2015, Penner et. al. 2012, Kinnman and Hawkins 2011). Biblical, missional, hospitality builds bridges and aligns the beliefs and actions of the church in a way that is relevant to the particular needs of their community. It will not be Syrian immigrants in every situation, but in every situation, and in every nation, there are strangers in need of loving relationships. Missiological hospitality brings about missiological relevance to Christian congregations. I found that practicing biblical hospitality brought a new awakening to the church’s mission, realities, and opportunities, resulting in action and the presence of spiritual fruit.
In “Widening our Welcome,” an article in a recent issue of Faith Today, Renée James looks at how God breathes new spiritual life into people through hospitality. James shares the stories of Lis Lam, David and Cathy Phillips, and Aaron and Cherie White, illustrating how the practice of hospitality has brought new meaning to their lives and to the people they host. She quotes Lam, “There’s an exchange that happens. You have a meal with someone, and at the end of the day you’re changed” (James 2020).
Park spoke of hospitality evangelism within a broken and suffering community. He reflects, “The good news was not new to them; it rather had to be proved good and true. Without genuinely caring about them and seeking to serve them as whole persons, without practicing biblical hospitality, we could not communicate God’s redeeming love in Christ with credibility” (Park 2002: 392).
As a follow up to the interview data, the final survey of one hundred and seventy-six churches also demonstrated that churches which have been engaged in hospitality with marginalized people in the last five years consistently describe themselves as being more healthy than those churches that only identify as “foyer friendly.”[4] Hospitable churches welcome new people as guests and seek to develop meaningful relationships with them. Less hospitable churches or “foyer friendly” churches tend to treat new people as visitors who show up for a visit and then go on their way. The results of the survey supported the findings of the narrative interviews.
The survey demonstrated that hospitable churches exhibit more growth, more outreach, more people developing and using their spiritual gifts, more community outreach, more cross-cultural outreach, a more robust experience of community, and more engagement with marginalized people in their community.
In 1990, Canadian missionary Arnel Motz wrote: “I would like to suggest that if we are going to reverse the present trends in Canada, we must trust God to bring us three winds of change: revitalization, reformation, and relevance” (Motz 1990:257).
While it is hard to determine the cause of spiritual fruit in an individual or believer, every church in the sample that was practicing biblical hospitality was also exhibiting spiritual fruit. I can conclude that spiritual fruit and hospitality accompany each other. I believe that practicing hospitality flows out of spiritual maturity, but it can also lead to spiritual maturity. It is the age-old question of the chicken and the egg, and my research is unable to identify which comes first, but in every church I interviewed, they existed together. I believe that the spiritual disciplines, of which hospitality is one, lead toward the progressive development of spiritual fruit and vitality in individuals and congregations. It is my interpretation that the discovery and practice of a contextual theology of hospitality should lead to spiritual reformation.
It is evident in the interviews that hospitality with Syrians has had a profound impact on the attitudes, perceptions, and feelings of Canadian Christians toward Syrians. The replacement of fear with friendship and favor is evidence of relational renewal.
I believe that hospitality is central to the mission of God. Churches that seek to be “missional” should thus seek to practice biblical hospitality. Hospitality is one way that Canadian evangelicals can reclaim a point of relevance with society outside their doors. Hospitality can connect us with the people who need to experience Jesus.
I conclude that a biblically informed, contextual theology and practice of hospitality contributes toward the revitalization, reformation, and relevance of the church in Canada. Hospitality toward strangers and outsiders can spark renewal in evangelical churches.
Recommendations
The art of biblical hospitality has been lost in modern western society. Long ago, replaced by a complex system of hospitals, hotels, and hostels, the church’s role as host has changed, but there are still ways in which the church can rediscover this ancient practice.
One way that Canadian churches may experience revitalization is through a contextually relevant practice of biblical hospitality. It is evident that Canadian churches practicing biblical hospitality also experience higher levels of spiritual vitality than churches that do not. Dreher argues that, as in Benedict’s day (referring to the church in the early sixth century as addressed by Saint Benedict), the modern church has lost its place and influence in society and needs to look back to its roots to discover meaning, purpose, and relevance (Dreher 2017: 1-5). Hospitality is not optional. Guided by the Gospels, Jipp concludes that “Hospitality to strangers was not an optional practice for the church, but is something that is deeply related to salvation… hospitality is a tangible testimony to our wholehearted embrace of Jesus’ person and message” (Jipp 2017: 7).
The following are five recommendations to assist Canadian churches in developing a contextual theology and practice of hospitality. [5]
1. Rediscover Biblical Hospitality
A review of Scripture and precedent literature paints a bright and colorful picture of the centrality of hospitality in the biblical narrative, the gospel, and the establishment of the church. Hospitality was a core discipline of the early church that served the rapid expansion of Christianity in the early centuries and made the gospel accessible to people who were previously outsiders, foreigners, and strangers. The practice of hospitality in most modern western churches is a faint shadow of the vivid picture portrayed in the early church. Genuine hospitality has become a lost art. “Families can be so fractured that few are able to slow down and open their hearts and hearths to anyone, let alone someone different” (Carroll: 54). My first recommendation is for Canadian churches to study and understand the theology of hospitality as a spiritual discipline and vivid reflection of the nature and mission of God.
2. Welcome Strangers
The early church grew and flourished through the discipline of hospitality. Worship in homes, hosting traveling pastors and missionaries, and the welcoming of strangers was significant in the rapid expansion of the church. The church is in decline in many western civilizations. Evangelicals and mainline congregations are asking why. I propose that one of the significant contributors to the decline of Christianity has been the loss of genuine hospitality in our culture. Many churches aspire no further than to be foyer friendly, extending a warm greeting, handshake, and perhaps a welcome package to visitors. Biblical hospitality is proactive. “Practicing hospitality is quite difficult and arduous. It involves our whole being, not just a part, and demands all we have, not just a portion” (Park 2002: 392).
Today the church must move outside its walls and be involved in the community. Churches that only focus on the care and nurture of their members are irrelevant and unbiblical. My second recommendation is for churches to be proactive in reaching out to people in the community, offering a warm welcome to people who are different. A hospitable church will not create barriers based on age, appearance, language, color, culture, gender, or other visible difference. Hospitable churches will welcome strangers.
3. Be Known for Our Love
Observing the ministry of Jesus, Paul, Peter, and others, we see that hospitality was not confined to the home or the church setting. Hospitality was observed on the road and in the community. People crowded Jesus on the road and the hillsides, but He made space for people. Despite all that was going on, He paused and paid personal attention to those He healed, those He visited, and those He called to follow Him. He demonstrated love for people who were different. Peter and Paul faced hostility as they entered some cities, and yet they expressed love and concern for those they met, even when the meeting was adversarial. We observe philoxenia brotherly love toward strangers. My third recommendation for churches is that they need to be known for their love for others rather than their judgment. Far too many people identify Christianity by what it is against than by what it is for (Christians are identified as judgemental, phobic, intolerant, condescending, and irrelevant rather than being known for our love – Jn. 13:35).
4. Know Our Neighborhood
Between November 4, 2015, and April 30, 2019, almost 64,000 Syrians entered Canada as refugees (Britten 2019). There has been a large number of Syrians entering Canada, but they have not been disbursed evenly into every community. Many communities will have no Syrian refugees present. This does not mean that some communities do not need the rediscovery of hospitality.
On the contrary, Syrian refugees are just one highly visible minority group which has been prominent in the media. Canada is a nation of immigrants. In 2018 to 2019 the Canadian population grew by 531,497 people, representing a 1.4% growth rate, the largest of any of the G7 countries. Eighty-two percent of that growth was through immigration (Statistics Canada July 2019). Syria ranked seventh behind the Philippines, India, China, Iran, Pakistan, and the United States as the top countries of birth of recent immigrants in the 2016 Census. While Syrians are a notable group of immigrants in Canada, they are by no means the largest group. My fourth recommendation to churches is that they must be intentional in learning who their neighbors are. Canadian information is easy to obtain through Outreach Canada (www.outreach.ca) or WayBase (www.waybase.com); other countries may have similar resources. A local church can quickly identify the demographics of their community by visiting with people in the neighborhood. There is no reason for a church not to know the ethnic demographics of their neighborhood.
5. Repent and Pray
Knowing who lives next door is a big step toward recognizing their needs and opportunities for connections. Churches do not have to sponsor a refugee to be hospitable. They can show hospitality to the people who have already arrived in their neighborhoods. As we have seen in Scripture, hospitality was not just for the foreigner or stranger, but also the widows, orphans, prisoners, and the sick. There are people in every neighborhood who need to experience God’s hospitality through the local church. My fifth recommendation for churches is to repent of fear and pride and pray that God will give them a vision for what biblical hospitality must look like in their immediate context. One size does not fit all. Each church must discern what God has called it to do in their own community. There will be contextual expressions of hospitality in each community that will be unique from other communities across Canada or around the world.
Works Cited:
Britten, Liam. “Where the Parties Stand on Immigration in This Election.” CBC News October 7 2019. https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/british-columbia/refugees-2019-election-1.5310154. Accessed 01/03/2020.
Carroll, Daniel M. The Bible and Borders: Hearing God’s Word on Immigration. Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2020
Dreher, Rod. The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation. New York: Sentinel, 2017.
James, Renée. “Widening Our Welcome.” Faith Today. Last modified July 6, 2020. Accessed July 15, 2020. http://www.faithtoday.ca/Magazines/2020-Jul-Aug/Widening-our-welcome.
Jipp, Joshua W. Saved by Faith and Hospitality. Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2017.
Kinnaman, David, and Aly Hawkins. You Lost Me: Why Young Christians Are Leaving Church-- and Rethinking Faith. Grand Rapids: BakerBooks, 2011.
Lutzer, Harold. “Muslim Outreach” Harvest Bible Chapel Kelowna, 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbtsZ2rJ1Hg&feature=youtu.be Accessed 07/03/2017.
Motz, Arnell. Reclaiming a Nation: The Challenge of Re-evangelizing Canada by The Year 2000. Richmond: The Church Leadership Library, 1991.
Oden, Amy. And You Welcomed Me: A Sourcebook on Hospitality in Early Christianity. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2001.
Ott, Craig and Juan Carlos Telez. “The Paradox of American Evangelical Views on Immigration: A Review of the Empirical Research” Missiology: An International Review 47:3, 2019
Park, Joon-Sik. “Hospitality as Context for Evangelism.” Missiology 30, no. 3 (July 1, 2002): 385–395.
Penner, James, Rachael Harder, Erika Anderson, Bruno Desorcy, and Rick Hiemstra. Hemorrhaging Faith: Why and When Canadian Young Adults Are Leaving, Staying and Returning to Church. 2012. hemorrhagingfaith.com.
Pohl, Christine D. Making Room: Recovering Hospitality as a Christian Tradition. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999.
Roxburgh, Alan J. Structured for Mission: Renewing the Culture of the Church. Downers Grove: IVP Books, 2015.
Sutherland, Arthur. I Was a Stranger: A Christian Theology of Hospitality. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2006.
Taylor, Jack. “Homes and Meals for Refugees.” Faith Today 38:1. January/February 2020.
Willis, Dustin, and Brandon Clements. The Simplest Way to Change the World: Biblical Hospitality as a Way of Life. Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2017.
Yong, Amos. “The Spirit of Hospitality: Pentecostal Perspectives toward a Performative Theology of Interreligious Encounter.” Missiology 35, no. 1 (January 1, 2007): 55–73.
Endnotes:
[1] Amos Yong provides an astute reflection on the parable of the Good Samaritan in “The Spirit of Hospitality.” Yong contends that there is an additional theological dynamic in the reciprocation of hospitality between Christians and those outside of the Christian faith (Yong 2007: 61).
[2] Kraft, Craig Clinton. Welcoming Strangers: Church Revitalization Through the Practice of Biblical Hospitality Toward Syrian Refugees in Canada. Asia Graduate School of Theology. 2020.
[3] This proverb was shared with me by Pastor Thomas Maphophe in 2004 when I was a new missionary in Africa. It helps to describe the common tension between Westerners who have a tendency to function with detailed schedules and attention to time, while the typical African is more concerned about people and relationships opposed to time or promptness.
[4] Foyer friendly A term used by the author to refer to churches that focus their hospitality on the welcoming of visitors to their church on a Sunday morning (in the foyer). As used by the author, “foyer friendly” churches may do a great job of greeting visitors, offering coffee and gifts, but do very little to follow up with those visitors or connect with them outside of the Sunday morning worship time.
[5] Note that at the time of writing, the COVID-19 Pandemic has put a temporary restraint on all forms of physical hospitality around the world. The following recommendations are still appropriate but will have to be practiced or contextualized based on local health recommendations and guidelines.