hospitality

if i am remembering correctly, over the past 2 months we have either been the guests in someone's house or have had guests 11 times.

hospitality is a good thing. i have been very impressed with the level of it at this church. i have been impressed with a lot of things at this church and that is why i desire to stay around here. though i must take this opportinity to vent:

we, as Christians, are instructed to "practice hospitality" (Romans 12:13). But in my experience (with the exception of this church and a few other select people), we mostly aren't. I have been to churches where, if I want, I could walk in virtually unnoticed, sit through the whole service and walk out without anyone coming up to talk to me. I could even stand around afterward and no one would come up and talk to me. It's sad. We aren't friendly, we aren't hospitable. We stay in our own cliques and don't reach out to new people who have come. And we aren't alert enough, to see when there are situations where people (who may have been attending for a while) have not yet found a group of friends. We need to reach out to these people. We need to be more friendly, more alert, more hospitable. Don't say "oh, that's the elders or the greeters job." No, the Bible was written to you and it says that you are supposed to be hospitable.

i'm preaching to myself here too 'cause i haven't perfected my hospitality. we all need to work on it.