RESOURCES FOR SABBATH SUNDAY

Hello, Ocean City Church! While we're not gathering together as a church on Sunday, January 1, we'd love for you to gather with your family or friends. Grab your Bible and a journal, and pray and ask Jesus to speak through His word and your time with Him. You can use as much as you'd like of what is included below to help guide your time together.

WORSHIP

Every year we take the Sunday after Christmas to pause from our normal Sunday routine and reflect on the Word of God in our homes. As we head into 2023, we are asking the Lord to help us truly receive His love and mercy that makes us whole and overflows into inviting anyone and everyone into the unending ocean of grace that is found in Jesus alone. 

PRACTICE HOSPITALITY

How do we share the love and grace of Jesus in this world? There are seminars,  books, and probably countless strategies dedicated to the topic of evangelism. While we certainly need help navigating the how-tos of the Great Commission, the Bible is so wonderfully practical and perfectly clear on this subject. God tells us to practice hospitality. Inviting people into the unending ocean of grace can begin simply by inviting people, strangers and believers in need, into your home. No one outgrows the need to experience the grace of Jesus, and what a way to experience this than to be welcomed and loved.

SCRIPTURE READING

Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality. (Romans 12:13)

Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers. (Hebrews 13:2)

Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. (1 Peter 4:19)

And probably the most challenging one Jesus says…

When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. (Luke 14:12-14)

DISCUSS/JOURNAL

There is a wonderful book, The Gospel Comes with a House Key: Practicing Radical Hospitality in Our Post-Christian World by Rosaria Butterfield, and in it, she says, “The Bible teaches that hospitality is not an option, but a requirement, for Christians. We have the opportunity to shine the light of Christ in dark places—even by opening our doors to those who may not know him.”

She calls it radically ordinary hospitality.

“Those who live out radically ordinary hospitality see their homes not as theirs at all but as God’s gift to use for the furtherance of his kingdom. They open doors; they seek out the underprivileged. They know that the gospel comes with a house key.”

What are the obstacles to practicing radical ordinary hospitality, and how might we overcome those challenges? Read through the following and discuss or journal your thoughts:

Too Busy to Add One More Thing: True, we don’t have endless amounts of time. So let’s don’t add one more thing. Maybe we do the same thing we were doing but just add a person or two. Invite someone into your completely mundane dinner routine.

I’m Not Good at Hosting: That might actually be refreshing. If hosting isn’t something that comes easily, just be normal. What people need is not to feel impressed but to feel welcomed into our ordinary, but extraordinary, life. A simple meal. A movie night. A pop-in, with a conversation and a cup of coffee.

I Don’t Know What to Talk about Sometimes: Practice curiosity. Learn to be a listener. Ask simple questions about their life. Don’t be afraid of the quiet. Quiet gives space for people to talk!

I Don’t Know Who to Invite Over: The Bible leads us toward practicing hospitality with both strangers and also with other believers in need that maybe aren’t in your regular sphere of friends or are in particular need in some way.

I’m Single and It Feels Hard to Do: Just start. Have a friend or someone from your City Group agree to host with you and then invite someone from work. If dinner seems daunting, invite them for popcorn and a movie night!

I Have Kids and It Feels Hard to Do: We know hosting can feel challenging with little ones, but it really can be easier than you think. Check out the video below for some encouragement from Shelley Whitmire, our Director of OCC Kids. Just do it!

Discuss or journal some other things that stop you from inviting people into your home and what you can do to overcome that.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

In her book, Rosaria says, “Let God use your home, apartment, dorm room, front yard, community gymnasium, or garden for the purpose of making strangers into neighbors and neighbors into family. Because that is the point—building the church and living like a family, the family of God. Radically ordinary and daily hospitality is the basic building block for vital Christian living. Start anywhere. But do start.”

We belong to God because of the incredible grace of Jesus that came through His sacrifice. We have a Father who loves us unconditionally and a Savior who stopped at nothing to show us that love. What a family we are in! Let’s invite others to experience this love and grace with us!

PRAY

Father in heaven, press down Your grace into our hearts, that your love may complete us. Give us boldness to live life as brave welcomers, inviting others to receive Your forgiveness and love.

FOR FURTHER STUDY

Read this Scripture again and discuss what it means and what it doesn’t mean. (Luke 14:12-14)

Read the commentary below from Enduring Word.

Jesus warns His host about the danger of pride when it comes to the guest list.

Then He also said to him who invited Him, “When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends, your brothers, your relatives, nor rich neighbors, lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you; for you shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just.”

When you give a dinner or a supper, do not ask your friends: Jesus spoke this specifically to him who invited Him. Jesus saw that His host chose his guests from a sense of exclusion and pride, lacking love to others. Jesus told him to not only ask those who could repay something to the host.

Do not ask is more properly “do not habitually ask” (Geldenhuys). It isn’t wrong to ever invite your friends, your brothers, and so on; but it is wrong to only invite such people.

Lest they also invite you back, and you be repaid: It is wrong to only associate with people who can advance us or give something to us. It is easy for us to limit our friends to a few comfortable, easy people, instead of reaching out to others.

Jesus here told us to not associate with people only on the basis of what they could do for us. That is self-centered living; we are called to follow Jesus, and He showed others-centered living.

There is something wonderful in giving a gift that can never be repaid. This is some of the more blessing Jesus spoke of when He said, It is more blessed to give than to receive (Acts 20:35). This helps to explain some of the pleasure of God in giving the gift of salvation and blessing to His people.

You shall be repaid at the resurrection of the just: This kind of living will cost us something; yet we will be repaid, with the full repayment coming at the resurrection of the just. Here again Jesus shows how important it is to live with an eternal perspective.

You shall be repaid reminds us that we will never be the loser when we give after the pattern of God’s generosity.