Within a community of believers who are known to each other, sometimes the love they show between each other is very evident.  They greet each other differently.  They have prayer groups where they share, they welcome each other into each other’s homes and share the benefits of common beliefs among themselves.  They study together, laugh together, worship together, comfort one another in times of trial, and seek the welfare of each other, often without question.

          Strangers are sometimes left to experience hospitality in an entirely different way.  Someone once asked Perle Mesta, the great Washington hostess, the secret of her success in getting so many people to attend her parties.  She said it was all in the greetings and the good-byes.  As each person arrived, she met him or her with “At last you’re here!”  And as each person left, she expressed her regrets with: ”I’m sorry you have to leave so soon!”

         Now, fast forward to the picture of immigrants and refugees in this country who have arrived hearing the greeting, “I’m sorry you came and are now here!”  And as each person is escorted out of the country hear the words, “You’re not welcome here, I’m glad you’re gone and don’t come back!”  Now imagine that level of hospitality as standard for many people who have been made to feel like unwelcome guests because of their ethnicity, their race, the color of their skin, their language, their gender, nationality, or language.  How many angels do you think may have been placed in ICE Detention Centers?  How many angels do you think may have died in ICE custody?  How many angels may have been deported illegally because of poor hospitality?

         While we can’t be responsible for a nations hospitality toward the strangers among us, we are responsible to ensure that our personal hospitality doesn’t imitate that of those whose hospitality toward strangers is highly suspect or cruel.  We’re called to live our lives as imitators of Christ and not the social structures under which we live.

• What can we do to make the strangers among us feel more welcome in our community? In our church?
• How does our hospitality reflect the love and welcome of Christ to others?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer —
Gracious God, give me a heart of love and acceptance of all people that they may experience the hospitality of Christ in our relationship.

         I’m not sure if people experience symptoms of bipolarity, multiple personality disorder or both, sometimes at the same time.  Bipolarity affects people who show extreme shifts in their mood, often swinging on one end from high energy, anger, or happiness to sadness, tiredness, and hopelessness on the other.  MPD (multiple personality disorder) by definition is someone who expresses two or more personality traits.  And it’s possible that people display symptoms of both.  Sometimes people are divided by who they are as Christians and who they are as people who belong to one political party or another.  They exhibit extreme highs when something goes against their political beliefs.  At the same time, they become extremely passive when something goes against their spiritual understanding of who they are.

         While this is not a clinical examination of two personality types, our society pushes the notion that we are somehow a Christian nation.  Yet — despite the presence of other non-Christian faiths —when we look for those Christian virtues directed toward immigrants and refugees, we find that those who have claimed Christ and who wield power are willing to allow evil to be directed toward those who are immigrants and refugees, rather than allowing the Spirit of good through Christian hospitality to rule their decisions.

         If Christian love is to be sincere and we are to seek and to do good, then abusing or ignoring the limits of Christian hospitality by allowing evil to thrive neither serves nor honors God.  It doesn’t invite us to maintain justice in the courts but allows evil to label us as hypocrites.  Pursuing God’s love by acknowledging our denomination’s social principles places us on the side of God’s justice and honors both God and good.

• What are some of the ways the church can do good and fight against evil in a political culture where immigrants and refugees are targets of White Christian Nationalist hatred?
• Where else in this current political climate can you see where doing good and opposing evil as a follower of Christ can have a significant impact?

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer —
Merciful God, make me a vessel of Your love and grace. Use me to do Your will using good as a spiritual weapon against the evil forces around me. (see also Ephesians 2:10)

         Love is the guiding principle for everything we believe about Christianity.  That principle is important in our relationship with good and evil.  We must love good and hate evil.  That principle is crucial to our desire to serve Christ.  It affects our relationship with others whether they are our friends, our enemies, or our brothers and sisters in the faith.  And it is most critical in our relationship with the moral and ethical challenges of the world around us.  We — all Christians everywhere — all called to be living witnesses of Christ’s love active in service to the world.  How we reflect that in our local communities doesn’t change our responsibility.  And a connecting link to our responsibility to love is our responsibility to show hospitality to those who are strangers in our midst.

         Our denominational effort has defined a Social Principle to guide us and keep us aware of that role. 

In ¶163.IV.G under Basic Rights and Freedoms, it says in short:

1. G) Migrants, Immigrants, and Refugees — We affirm the dignity, worth, and rights of migrants, immigrants, refugees, including displaced or stateless people, recognizing the growing global displacement crisis caused by war, famine, climate change, failed protections, and other forces. We urge United Methodists to welcome them into their congregations and provide concrete, practical support with immigration processes, food, housing, education, employment, and other needs. We oppose all laws and policies that separate families, criminalize, dehumanize, and detain in inhumane conditions displaced persons, and for-profit detention centers for such purposes.[1]

         So, we — by the word of God and in agreement with the policy of our church — have a moral and spiritual responsibility to those who are strangers in our community.  We have a spiritual obligation proposed by God to show them hospitality as well as a social responsibility laid out by the church to show those strangers among us the same love that Christ showed us.  In doing so, we empower ourselves to live faithfully to both the gospel of Jesus Christ as the church gives honor to the Word of God.

• What have been your feelings as you’ve seen our governments actions against those who are considered immigrants and displaced persons in our community?
• What can we do as a church to be a more active living witness to Christ’s love to the strangers around us?

[1] The Book of Discipline of The United Methodist Church, The Social Principles, p.147

Todays Prayer

Today’s Prayer
Gracious God, gently guide my heart to bear witness to Your love in my community and throughout the world. Enable me to welcome each person I meet with the warmth of Your hospitality.