Please note: The following sermon is provided as a resource for the thought, prayer, and meditation of the members and friends of St. Mark's. It is the residue of a verbal event, and thus it does not have academic footnotes and other details that would be expected in a written document. The writer gladly acknowledges the prior thought and work of many Christians before him.

Has anyone been noticing how the lessons these past few weeks have been leading into one another?

The sermon seems to pick up right where the last one left off and expand upon the same thought.

We've thought about Grace, and Grace in action.

And so last week we expanded on that with  GO and DO in the parable of the Good Samaritan, and today it is balanced with STAY and LISTEN in the story of Mary and Martha at home.

They are pairs of words that need to be understood together.

And today we will work with them under a heading that includes them both: hospitality.

We think that we have a good idea of what “hospitality” means:

coffee, cookies, veggies, and grapes and other variations on the theme

            in the narthex after worship.

We've discovered that offering that little bit of food and drink slows people down from the headlong rush out the door, and encourages people to talk with each other.

So food is part of hospitality, taking time to greet one another is another part.

But there is more.

Last week's Gospel was the parable of the Good Samaritan, the despised foreigner who took the big risk to stop and care for the wounded man.

That is hospitality on another level.

The First Lesson today concerns the hospitality which Abraham and Sarah show to the three unknown visitors.

Following the customs of that time and place, they treat the strangers as honored guests.

What a positive model they are!

Then in today's Gospel we hear of Jesus visiting in the home of Mary and Martha, and the hospitality which these two women show him.

There is the hospitality of bustling around and caring for food and comforts, and there is also the hospitality of attentive listening.

And both kinds of hospitality are needed: that of Mary and of Martha.

It is the hospitality which we can discern in the Second Lesson today that directs us in a different way.

In him all things hold together, Paul says.

And a few lines later, he says:

            And you who were once estranged and hostile in mind, doing evil deeds, he has now reconciled in his fleshly body through death....

Put back together with God,...by God.

That is God's hospitality...to us.

That is the Good News, the best news that there ever could be.

How many different ways we have messed up the relationship with God!

How many ways have we willfully done our own thing, ignored the commands and promises of God, tramped on others of God's children.

Each person who has spoken for God ever since Moses of old has complained of being ignored by the very people who are supposed to be the most alert to the message of God.

The prophet Elijah, the prophet Jonah, etc. etc. all joined in the loud lament that the people are going their own ways.

How easy it is to forget that all these things which surrounds us are not our own;

we only hold all of it in trust.

How easy it is to forget that the people around us are just as valuable to God as we are; we have no reason to boast.

God is the one who breaks down the barriers, establishes our relationship with the Lord Jesus, and through it, with other people.

It is God's doing, God's hospitality, which first of all we can receive, and in which we live henceforth.

I recently heard of a fancy dinner at a local institution, where the person in charge stood to do the acknowledgments, and included: “Oh, yes, thanks to all of the peons who work here, too.”

Now, there is a person who does not understand hospitality very well at all!

What an outrageous and unkind thing to say, building up barriers where none should be.

At Katy's wedding in Spain in February, we discovered that only a couple of the servers spoke enough English for me to communicate with them, but through those two we made sure that every server understood that there was a bouquet of flowers for each one to take home after the event.

It was one small touch of hospitality that we offered to those persons who were serving us so hospitably.

We become able to offer hospitality because, wonder of wonders, we had first received it,

from God and  through others.

It all fits with the observation that we find in 1 John: We love because God first loved us.   [1Jn4:19]

It fits with our understanding of the 10 Commandments which begin with God's gift of grace to us: I am the Lord your God before there are any commands voiced.

The grace came prior to expectations.

Isn't that wonderful Good News?

First, there is grace, or to use today's term, God's hospitality.

And then there is the possibility of our responding in like manner, with the commandments of God as our guide.

[For those remembering the conversations about this in the Way, this is an instance of the Third Use of the Law.]

It fits with what Abraham had experienced before the three visitors.

God chose Abraham just because, not due to any particular merit on Abraham's part, but...just because.

It empowers Abraham to respond with hospitality in subsequent situations, such as when the three visitors come.

This understanding of grace, God's hospitality, extends all the way back to the very first stories in scripture.

The creation stories make it clear that we do not deserve that which we have; it all belongs to God who made it, but who shares it even with us who are forever inventing new ways to try to claim what God gives as our right and possession, instead of recognizing them as gifts from the Lord God who made them.

Oh, the wonder that God has not given up on the whole enterprise.

Oh, that grace and God's hospitality continue.

Oh, that Christ Jesus holds things together with the gift of his love.

Henri Nouwen had an interesting way of thinking about this.

He looked to marriage as a prime vehicle for hospitality.

He said, “ God calls a man and a woman into a different relationship, one that looks like two hands that fold in an act of prayer.

The fingertips touch, but the hands can create a space, like a little tent. Such a space is one created by love, not fear.

Marriage, then, is creating a new, open space where God's love can be revealed to the 'stranger:' the child, the friend, the visitor.”

Marriage creates a new space for God's hospitality to be received and given away.

What a wonderful image!

All of us, whether married or not, have received God's hospitality.

What have we done with it?

At the end of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus says that the test of our fidelity to him is not our wide-ranging knowledge of the Bible, or our ability to recite all three creeds.

The major test is: I was hungry and you gave me food. I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger and you welcomed me.

The major test is our hospitality modeled on that of God.

As we sing in a moment:

            All good thoughts and all good living

            Come but by your gracious giving.

                                                [LBW #248.2]

Hospitality: it certainly involves punch and cookies, but it includes so much more.

St. Mark's Lutheran Church

142 Market Street

Williamsport, Pennsylvania

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