Hospitality and the Life of Jesus

Hospitality and Evangelism

Jesus arguably did most of his ministry around tables. It seems like everywhere you look, he’s sharing a meal with someone. Often, the people he was with were those you’d least expect. In an age where the people you ate with were a reflection on your social standing, it’s clear that Jesus wasn’t interested in maintaining his reputation among the elites. He makes this clear when he shows love to a despised tax collector and his sinful compatriots. Take a look:

After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, and Levi got up, left everything and followed him.

Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”

Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (Luke 5:27–32 NIV).

If the significance of this passage doesn’t strike you, it’s because you’ve grown so used to the notion that it’s virtuous to be hospitable toward the marginalized. But it hasn’t always been this way. Bible Scholar Donald Hagner helps us understand the significance of this:

“Table fellowship in that culture was regarded as a very important symbol of the closeness, indeed the oneness, of those participating…For Jesus and his disciples to be at the same table with tax collectors and sinners implied a full acceptance of them.” 

When Jesus sat at the table with Levi and his friends, he was saying to them, “you’re with me.” As a result, their lives were changed. 

We often don’t realize this, but there is a strong correlation between hospitality and evangelism. When we think of evangelism, we might think of people knocking on doors and sharing tracts. But this is not how Jesus went about it. Jesus got into the lives of people, and within a relationship of love, invited them to the gospel party. Ultimately, that’s what hospitality is about—reaching out to those who are far from God and inviting them into a place where they can be known and loved. This is what Jesus followers have done for millennia, and it’s how we’re going to continue to change the world today.

Have you ever had anyone evangelize you? How did it make you feel? What can you learn from it?

Does framing “evangelism” in terms of “hospitality” change your impression of it in any way? How?

How might God be inviting you to grow in inviting others to know him?