In this sermon, Greg expands upon the call to be a people of hospitality as he highlights four specific groups of people who experience marginalization. As God has welcomed us in his divine hospitality, we also are to participate in God’s hospitality and show it to those who most need it.
Opportunities that Greg mentioned:
Immigrants, Refugees, Foreigners
Prisoners
The Poor and Homeless
People with Cognitive Disabilities
Ephesians 5:1-2 reads, “Be imitators of God. Live in love as Christ loved us and gave his life for us…” As God has been hospitable to us, we are to be hospitable to others. In a world that is increasingly fragmented and isolated, we are to be a people who have open arms to those who need it the most.
In this magnificent vision of Revelation 7, we see the gathering of people from around the world, thereby fulfilling the calling of Israel. It is the completion of God’s promise to Abraham in Genesis 12 to be a blessing to the entire world. The Jewish 144,000 now becomes an innumerable crowd gathered from every tribe, nation, people and language. This includes marginalized people, those who are least welcomed in our world. These are the people we are to welcome in the greatest way. In this sermon Greg highlights four marginalized groups to whom we are called to show hospitality.
The first group includes immigrants, refugees and foreigners. The Bible repeatedly commands a hospitable stance toward these people (Leviticus 19:33-34). No other nation outside of Israel had any teachings that resembled this kind of treatment of foreigners. At best, foreigners were second-class citizens. The hospitable God wants a people who stands out from everyone else by how they are hospitable to immigrants. Jesus, himself, was actually a refugee and an immigrant who had to flee to Egypt for his own safety.
The second group is prisoners. In Matthew 25, Jesus says, “you visited me when I was in prison.” Jesus tells us that prisoners should be on our mind because he identifies with them.
The poor and the homeless comprise the third group. It’s important to remember that Jesus himself was homeless during his ministry (Matthew 8:20).
The final group is people with disability labels. Such people are left out and marginalized in every part of society.
It is important for us to listen to the prompting and leading of the Spirit to see how God would have us demonstrate his hospitable heart. We cannot do everything, but we can listen and follow God’s leading.
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