About Welcomes

April 23, 2017 | My Jottings

Yesterday afternoon I looked at the thermometer on the railing of my front deck, and it read 72 degrees. Unless you live north of Minneapolis, you might not realize how glorious this was. Lime green buds have formed on the trees, robins are hopping around in yards and on my next door neighbor’s roof, and the grass is greening everywhere.

This morning, it’s snowing.

Big flakes are drifting from the greyish sky, and in less than twelve hours my mindset has shifted from exploring mode to nesting mode. We Minnesotans know that any snow that falls in late April won’t be around for long, so we don’t despair, but we still take note. And write about the weather incessantly on our blogs and in our newspapers, and talk about it with cashiers and waiters we aren’t acquainted with.

Yesterday I was invited over for breakfast and devotions at my friends Steve and Diane’s house. I hadn’t spent time with them in a while, and it was a delight to share over three hours with them, catching up but only scratching the surface. I wish all our days could be as full yet as leisurely as what I experienced in their home. They are in the process of completely renovating a lovely old house, so there was sheetrock on the walls, exposed joists and much left to be done, yet it was the warmest, most welcoming haven. I remember Michael’s and my first home, and how we lived with remodeling for a long time, but still loved to have people over. If it didn’t bother us, we were hoping it wouldn’t bother anyone else.

We recited part of the Heidelberg Catechism, sang some scripture songs, read from the Old and New Testaments and the Psalms, and the day’s devotional from Spurgeon. We prayed together and had the most delicious late breakfast I’ve had in longer than I can remember.

Diane made homemade English muffins, which were cooked in a skillet, and breakfast sausage sauteed together with onion and peppers and tiny potatoes, with perfectly cooked over-easy eggs on top of all the savory goodness. We smeared strawberry jam over the hot English muffins, sipped coffee and orange juice, and sat around the table visiting and while the last hour passed in no time.

We talked of the bond that happens when you prepare food with someone and then sit down at the table to enjoy it together, a pleasure from the Lord we often rush through or forego entirely as we sit in front of the TV with plates on our laps. We talked about how possible it might be that being nourished by slow and purposeful food preparation in the company of those we love (and/or those we’ve newly invited) could feed us in a way that would help us to not fill up so mindlessly on food itself. A profound thought for me.

I want to keep opening my home and have set a loose goal of having a group of people over at least once a month for a nice meal. I learned from Steve and Diane (and Diane’s mom Mary Lou) yesterday that it might not be necessary to have every single thing done by the time people walk in the door. I would like to learn to be less precise, less scheduled, when it comes to hospitality. I will keep at it, and ask the Lord to guide me. After all, He is the Master of welcome, and would teach me much if I sat at His feet to listen.

This summer the women’s Bible study I host in my home will be doing “Wonder Struck” by Margaret Feinberg. I’m reading the trade book in preparation for the study itself, and it’s excellent. Our group hasn’t done a study by Margaret before, so it will seem quite different of course, after having done so many Beth Moore and Priscilla Shirer courses. I’m usually not one who loves change, but in this area I’m craving it.

In one of the chapters of Margaret Feinberg’s trade book, I loved her words about Lent:

“I couldn’t help but reflect on the way I had approached the forty days before Easter. I’d approached the season by asking, ‘What will I give up for Lent?’ as if Lent’s whole focus is asceticism. But Lent’s concern isn’t in removing something as much as receiving Someone. The passion of Lent is Christ. The annual sojourn calls for a more focused relationship with God.”

I “received” Jesus Christ as my Savior when I was twelve years old, but I want to receive Him again and again, around my table, in my mind, through my music, in my prayers, through my friends, through His Word and at His table. It’s such a wonderful and mysterious journey we walk as Christians. I’m grateful for the lovely ways He unfolds things to us as we face each day with Him.

My next door neighbor’s daughter gave her season tickets to our local community playhouse, so my neighbor (also a widow) invited me to see the current production with her. Last night she and I went out to dinner and saw a musical I have no words for. It was called “La Cage Aux Folles,” and apparently a movie called “The Birdcage” was based on it, which I never saw. We had seats in the middle, second row back, so were presented with details I didn’t want from men made up and dressed as women and men in passionate love with men, and I will be honest, if my dear neighbor hadn’t invited me I would have slipped out and gone home. The “moral” people in the show who were said to value traditional families were made to be complete buffoons, and I guess this is the way of things now.

It just made me want to come home, talk to the Lord about a few things (like my own self-righteousness, lack of love, clinging to my safe and familiar ways), and plan to open my home to some friends for a slow and nourishing meal. Soup, bread, salad, and heartening conversation. Nothing mocking, hopefully nothing irreverent. Hope around the table, and fellowship, that’s what I want.

Do you regularly have guests in for a meal? I’d love to know if you do or don’t, and your thoughts on this.

Lastly, have any of you watched the new show on TV called “Long Lost Family?” It’s on TLC (The Learning Channel on cable) and if you haven’t seen it, you must! It comes on here Sunday nights, but I record it on the DVR so we always have the episodes. I think it’s one of the best things on television. Each week there are two stories about someone looking for family they didn’t grow up with, either because an adoption took place, or the separation of siblings due to family hardship. Two really compassionate and likeable people who themselves were adopted as children, research and research and research through the online site called Ancestry, and help reunite siblings or children to their birth parents. Sara and I watch it every week and we wouldn’t miss it. It’s one of the most uplifting, encouraging, loving shows on television. It exemplifies the adoptive, restoring heart of God and I hope if you haven’t seen it, you’ll watch it tonight. Or whenever it’s on in your area. Here’s a short trailer if you’d like to see.

Well, I guess I’ll wish you all a blessed Sunday, and begin my day. May the peace and strength of Jesus fill our minds and homes, I pray….