“Personal Hospitality”

Tuesday, June 04, 2013

      Is the instruction in Hebrews 13, to be hospitable to strangers, given to the church or simply individuals?  If it applies to the church, how would one distinguish a Christian stranger from a non-Christian stranger since our benevolence is limited to Christians?

Sincerely,
Giving

Dear Giving,

It is true that as a congregation, a local church’s work is limited to caring for the needy Christians, but Heb 13:2 is a command to individual Christians.  There is a difference between what we can do as individuals and what we can do as the church united (for example, 1 Tim 5:9-11 says the church can only provide for the needs of certain kinds of widows, but we as individuals can take care of whatever type of widows we want). Hebrews 13 involves a lot of commands that clearly apply to individuals – like how to take care of your marriage (Heb 13:4).  The command to be hospitable and entertain strangers is an individual command that we all should personally heed.

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