Hospitality 101

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, I won't leave the hat on.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I just say happy birthday America.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: How's that?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Uh

Pastor Dale Tunnell: After the uh religious liberty video, I was thinking I should change my sermon.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Um

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Um didn't know if I should change it and speak on uh Revelation 13 uh or speak about uh religious liberty or talk about uh

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The United States of America, how blessed we are to live here.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, Amen is correct.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Talk about a little bit about our history.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Statue of Liberty, the plaque at the base of the Statue of Liberty begins with Give me your tired

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, send these

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The homeless, the tempest tossed to me.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, you can tell it's written by somebody else for us, right?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But for years we accepted that gift, lived by that

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Believed that, shouted that to the world.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We accepted what another nation had clothed us with.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Give us your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Is that the way we always feel?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Today?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I know I'm getting political.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Some of you say, stop that.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But this is part of the introduction, okay?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We've been going through a series of one-anothering Bible texts.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And if you were listening to the scripture reading,

Pastor Dale Tunnell: you understand where we are in our one-anothering Bible text series.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Today's, uh it says it in the bulletin, I think, hospitality 101

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Should I read it again?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Give me your tired, your poor, your idle masses, yearning to be breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Send these, the homeless, tempest toss to me.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I lift my lamp beside the golden door.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Well, somebody better have a little bit of hospitality to offer when they arrive.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Many times as a pastor, I talked to my pastoral friends and and I listened to their sermons and their stories and

Pastor Dale Tunnell: one of the questions that in conversation you have with people, you say, Well, what do you do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: When someone asks as a pastor, well what do you do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, man.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I know what happens when I say I'm a pastor.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, so many times when I those words come out of my mouth, it's like the person, what do I say now?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I don't know what to do with a pastor.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I don't know where to go with the conversation.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And so, as pastors, we come up with kind of creative ideas.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: As to what to say.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I told you about my father who met my neighbor one time.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And my father, after meeting my neighbor, my the neighbor asked my father, and what do you do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And my father says, I sell insurance.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Well, what kind of insurance do you sell?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He says, I sell fire insurance.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now remember, my dad's a pastor selling fire insurance.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He had heard the man say that he was in the insurance business, so Dad was trying to to make some connections there

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I heard another pastor say to the answer to the question, and what do you do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And he said, I'm in the hospitality business.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What do you think if somebody says they're in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, what does that even mean?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean when you say that you're in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, some of the things that come to your mind are do they work for a cruise ship

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean they know how to fold the towels?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You know, so they look like a monkey or an alligator or

Pastor Dale Tunnell: they can, you know, hang them on the just right.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They know how to do the toilet paper so that it's what's it mean to be in the the the hospitality business for the cruise ship

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean they know how to give warm greetings?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean they know how to do timely service?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean in the hospital?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does it mean the hotel industry?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean if you're in the hotel industry, you're in the hospitality industry.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean that you're you're the doorman at the hotel?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean that you are are are uh uh

Pastor Dale Tunnell: the person that stands at the desk and and welcomes people, does that mean that you're you're in the the the breakfast buffet?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean if you are in the the hospital the restaurant?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Are they in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean if you're in the hospitality business and you work at the re you're the matre D.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: How many are in your party?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm sorry.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Do you have a reservation?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Cheryl and I used to like it.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We would go in there in Hanoi.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We would go to one restaurant and we like to eat our our dinner a little bit early.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We're five o'clock, five thirty

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oftentimes we would go to this one restaurant, and it was a rather large restaurant, and we would show up there between 5 and 5.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: 30, and their first question was, Do you have a reservation?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And our answer is, no.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Let me see.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we would look at the restaurant and it's empty.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I wonder what they we're not going to take up the whole restaurant.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Why do they

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You kind of worried if I I was worried about their their hospitality there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Their hospitality in the restaurant they're supposed to be welcoming and encouraging and and and trying to

Pastor Dale Tunnell: to to bring you in.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If you're in the hospitality, does that mean you're event planning?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Does that mean you're you're the host for weddings and and birthdays and anniversaries?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You have uh an event, place, location that you are are

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Managing?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean to be in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Entertainment section.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Space, theme parks, recreational facilities.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, you get started with some of these things.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean to be in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And why in the world would a pastor say, I'm in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Is church in the hospitality business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, yeah, you probably wouldn't have come up with that on your own, would you?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: When I say it, when the words come out of my mouth, you think, hmm, maybe we are

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, if you are in a church kind of like we are, where there are several Adventist churches around in the community, you can get to another one.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oftentimes you will hear the phrase

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We're the friendliest church in the neighborhood.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I lived in another place far, far away that had lots of churches in the community.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We had one that was a mile away and one that was a mile and a half away.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I would often hear at those churches, we're the friendliest church around.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I wonder, are we the friendliest?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does it mean to be a friendly church

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Why don't we change the word a little bit and say, we're the most hospitable church around?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The reason we don't change that word is because that word we're the most hospitable church around.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: implies something we're not sure we want to mean.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And so we use the word friendly.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because with friendly, I can get away with

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Hello.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Hi.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Happy Sabbath.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: See you later.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We're a friendly church

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But with a hospitable church, that entails a little bit more than sometimes we want to give.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: First Peter 4 9.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: See, I gotta make sure I'm at the right place.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Offer hospity, hospitality to one another without grumbling

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Boy, wouldn't it have been nice if Peter had just stopped with offer hospitality to one another?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We may get back to that one.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Romans chapter twelve.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Paul writes, Share with the Lord's people who are in need.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Practice hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: These are are God's servants riding to the churches to practice hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Third John chapter one, verse eight.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We ought to therefore to show hospitality to such people so that we may work together for the truth.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now, once you notice, John, Peter, and Paul are all telling the church to practice, to perform.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: John here says, so that you may work together for the truth.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This is to be hospitable to those people that are coming and sharing the good news.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because if you're hospitable to them, it's as if you are sharing the good news yourself.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You can get in on the on the practice of of sharing Jesus with others.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Ah how'd I get that in there twice?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I guess I'm good.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We'll go Hebrews thirteen two.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Some thought I should use this as my scripture reading.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Do not forget to show hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it

Pastor Dale Tunnell: No, I kind of like this text.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This text is interesting to me.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If you

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If you're reading it with just a little bit of Greek, you know the word hospitality comes from the word philosophers.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now, most of us, we know the word filio.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: From the word Philadelphia, what's that mean?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Phileo means to to love

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We in our society today, we've heard the word xenos a little bit in our society, in our culture today, but it's often not connected with phileo.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It's connected with xenophobia.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We know what phobia is, right?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Fear.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And that word xenos means the stranger.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: So that's to be afraid of strangers

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Scripture doesn't say to be afraid of strangers.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What does Scripture tell us to do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The word for hospitality means to love strangers.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now go back to Hebrews there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Notice the writer of Hebrews.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I like to think that's Paul, but some of you may disagree with that

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But notice the writer of Hebrews says, do not forget to show hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What's the word for hospitality?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Love strangers.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And then he adds again to strangers.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He wants to make sure that we understand

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To love strangers, to show hospitality to strangers, because in so doing you may be showing hospitalities to angels

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And not even be aware of it.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Are we ready to be a church that says, give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The wretched refuse of your teeming shore, Send these, the homeless, the tempest toss to me, I lift my lamp beside the golden door

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Are we ready to post such words outside the church and say, this is our motto?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This is our mission statement.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To love strangers

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm going to turn the screws just a little tighter.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This is especially for elders.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But it's not just elders.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I believe in the in scripture when you look at this.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This is talking about the leadership of the church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The leadership.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: First Timothy chapter 3.

1 Timothy 3 · chapter mention

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Boy, I put that on the little font there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I can't read that myself, so I'm gonna have to

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Give me a moment.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You may be able to see it, but uh First Timothy chapter 3 verse 2, talking to the elders, it says

1 Timothy 3:2

Pastor Dale Tunnell: A bishop or an elder says must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach, and it continues on

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I want you to see that it says for elders, they are supposed to be hospitable.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Why would church leadership, why would Paul say,

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Church leadership is supposed to be hospitable.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He says it not just here in Timothy, but in Titus, he says it again.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: In Titus chapter one.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, I'm turning to it again.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This'll be a lesson.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Let's see if I learn it

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Titus chapter 1, it's talking to the elders again.

Titus 1 · chapter mention

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It says, to be hospitable, a lover of what is good, sober-minded, just, holy, self-controlled.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This is an admonition to the elders, to the church leadership.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The church needs to be a place of hospitality

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It needs to be led by people that are hospitable people.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The church needs to be, dare I say, in the hospitality business.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Are you part of the church?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Who, me?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, thank you.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I got a yes there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You're part of the church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What business are you in

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now, if I stop here for just a moment and ask you to shout out examples from the Bible

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I think I know what you're gonna say first.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Abraham, because I brought up that one about entertaining angels, right?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now Abraham there in in in Genesis went out and he he called the Lord and the angels that were with the Lord to come into his tent, and he showed them hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: In the next chapter, Lot goes out to the angels that show up at Sodom.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And Lot shows the angels hospitality and calls them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: into his home to protect them from whatever lived in Sodom.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Little did he know that by protecting those angels he was protecting himself.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I think about Rebecca.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You ever think about Rebecca and the

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Well Eliezer was going to look for a bride for for Isaac.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What did she do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: She watered his camels.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Think about offering a cup of water to someone as a

Pastor Dale Tunnell: sign of hospitality, how much more so to to water the camels.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They tell us that if a camel has been traveling for what they we think that a tra camel would be traveling for

Pastor Dale Tunnell: for a time like that, that camels would be in the habit of drinking somewhere between twenty to thirty gallons of water.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Can you imagine having to draw thirty gallons of water for ten camels

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Well, you talk about being hospitable, I guess that shows up in the area of hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I think about the woman who who who hosted Elijah and continued to to feed him with

Pastor Dale Tunnell: the the last little bit of flour that she had, the last little bit of oil that she had, and continued to feed him, and continued to feed him, and continued to feed him.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And this hospitality went on and on.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, our text said there in 1 Peter, continue with hospitality with what?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Without grumbling.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Do you realize how hard that is?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To do it without grunt.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, sometimes we do it because the pastor stood up front, he preached a sermon about it, he stepped on our toes, and so, oh man.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Okay.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we step out and we do it.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And as soon as we don't have to be hospitable anymore, oh boy, we let everybody know how

Pastor Dale Tunnell: That hurt us.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: That damn how how uncomfortable that was for we tend to

Pastor Dale Tunnell: grumbled about do you think she grumbled about having to take care of Elijah?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Or do you think this having to take care of Elijah became a a testimony of God's providence?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: A testimony of God's love, his care, his concern.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: A testimony of how God wanted to open the windows of heaven and pour out a blessing.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Yeah, it's on the screen.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You can read it there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm gonna read it for you

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Adventist Home, page four hundred and fifty.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh man, if you want to read about hospitality, go to the book Adventist Home.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: There's a chapter there towards the end of it on on hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But look at this paragraph it says.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Christ keeps an account of every expense incurred in entertaining for his sake

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He supplies all that is necessary for this work.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Those who for Christ's sake entertain their brethren

Pastor Dale Tunnell: doing their best to make the visit profitable both to their guests and to themselves, are recorded in heaven as worthy of special blessings.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Well, we need to highlight that one, don't we?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It says there, Christ keeps an account of every expense incurred.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It's as if we are laying up treasures in heaven.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He knows.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, the biggest excuse I hear from people, I can't be hospitable, we We don't have the means to do that.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Think about what you're saying for just a minute, okay?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The disciples came to Jesus and said, These people need to eat

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And Jesus says to them, Feed them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We don't have enough food to feed them.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Can we send them to the villages around here?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And Jesus says to the disciples, No, you feed them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: All we have here is five loaves, two fish.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What is that?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: For so many.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And what does Jesus do?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Can Jesus still work miracles today

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I was listening to someone talking about hospitality and they told the story about a

Pastor Dale Tunnell: A couple told the story about how they had visited a church and it was a very nice church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They enjoyed church, but after church that there was a family that invited them to their house to eat.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because no one else invited them.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: There was they just got to talking and and no one else had invited this couple home.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And so this family invited them home and they said, We went to their house and they served us.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Breakfast cereal.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we knew right then and there that they were hospitable

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because they cared more about us and our relationship than they did of making sure everything was perfect.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You know, Jesus could have.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Think about what Jesus could have done.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Jesus could have provided

Pastor Dale Tunnell: grapes for everybody in the multitude.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He could have provided pomegranate.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He could have provided olives for all of them.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean this was

Pastor Dale Tunnell: This was the right place, the right culture to provide such things.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But what does Jesus provide for them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The simple the common, the the the ordinary

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Not something something extra special.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: With a little bit of I'm I talking about there, we don't have the right stuff.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm I'm talking that's one of the excuses.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: People

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The second excuse that people use is I don't know what to talk to people about.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm just going to tell you with just a little bit of preparation

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I mean little bit of preparation.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You can send me an email and I can send you like fifty questions to get you started.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I can give you some questions and coach you and tell you how to start conversations with people.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You just ask some people the right question and they'll just carry on.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You ask them, I I wrote a couple of them down.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Can you tell me what your favorite car has been through in your life?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, you asked some men what this question you may not

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Your eyes are gonna glaze over when they start answering.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You ask them, what's the best book you've ever read?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now, I know there may be some people that just give you a one-word answer.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I understand that.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You ask them, what's your favorite teacher?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What'd you like about him?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: These kind of questions get you get you get you going.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What's the favorite vacation that you've taken?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What hobbies do you have?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What's the thing you're looking forward to the most within the next year?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And it continues on.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm gonna tell you the University of Kansas.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They did a little bit of research about uh

Pastor Dale Tunnell: developing relationships, making friends.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And they said to make a casual acquaintance, a casual acquaintance, a casual friend

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You need at least 40 to 60 hours together to make a casual friend.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Some of us have a long way to go, don't we?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Eighty sorry, eighty to a hundred hours if you want a regular friend, a good friend.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Two hundred hours if you want it to be your best friend, a close friend.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If you want a, the words that I heard were, if you want a relationship that is strong enough that it can bear the weight of truth.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Some of us try to bear the weight of truth at casual friendships, and when we try and bear the weight of truth at casual friendships, it does not bear the weight.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And then we are worried, Why don't I have any friends?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It's because we share the truth too soon.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We need to build a relationship.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We need to practice hospitality

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I come back to that practicing hospitality.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Verse ch Peter, 1 Peter 4, verse 9.

1 Peter 4:9

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Offer hospitality without grumbling.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Do you know how easy it is to grumble?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean, sometimes when we offer hospitality, I remember when our kids were were young and our our children were not always excited about us bringing

Pastor Dale Tunnell: guests to the house.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The church we were first in, we had fellowship dinner uh once a month

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We had two churches, had once a month at another church that left two Sabbaths where we could invite people over.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We often had people over in our homes.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Cheryl worked really hard with our children to get them to enjoy having people over.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I remember that she made a gift box.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And inside that box it was had nice wrapping paper.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Inside the box she had gifts

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Uh, you know, went to the dollar store or went to a thrift store or found some things that she thought children might like or or people might like, and she put gifts inside the box.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But then she put our children in charge of that gift box.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And our children at the just the right time, they we would okay now, and we would give them the signal and they would say

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We have a gift for you.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And you get to put your hand inside the box.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And if you're lucky, we'll open the top of the box and you can look at what's in there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And you can choose something out of the gift box.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You know what that did to grumbling from our children?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: That stopped it.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: All of a sudden they had a reason for living.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: For having people over to the house.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They enjoyed having people over at the house because somebody had made a plan ahead of time

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now sometimes we as a church we think we have a plan ahead of time

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I've been to many churches and I I've seen the plan.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We have potluck.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I don't like that phrase, that word.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We have fellowship dinner.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we have fellowship dinner.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We do it twice a month here at this church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I just talk about I'm not talking specifically about this church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm talking about Adventist churches that I have been in.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we have uh uh potluck and we go to potluck and we say we're so happy to have our guests here today, and we would like all our guests to come through line first.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And so we send our guests through line first.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They go through line, they get their food, and then our guests sit down at a table, and all our guests are sitting at one table.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And then the members go through line, and because the guests are all sitting at a table, our members, we sit and our friends we haven't seen since last week.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we are sitting with our friends instead of with the guests.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But we're hospitable because we provided potluck for them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I know it's potluck sabbath, so you be listening to what I'm saying here, okay?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Wouldn't it be better?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If we had an idea that we we sat down at tables before we went through line

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And then we were sitting at tables and we were were not knowing which one, I mean we know which one's guest and which one's not, but we're not just sitting in the order we come through line.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We get to choose where to sit, and then somebody dismisses the tables, and then the guests actually get to sit with somebody that's a member.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh man, I'm gonna tell you, I've seen it work beautifully

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And the guests usually have this to say This is a very hospitable church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now I know what you're thinking, but Pastor, we only have potluck twice a month.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean fellowship dinner twice a month.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: You're right.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What do we do the other weeks?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Now I've been in some homes and I know that there are people in homes that they have a nice place to to have three or four families together.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What would happen if we had a plan as a church for for two families or three families to come together?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But then we said, okay, those two or three families are going to come together, they're each going to contribute to something, but they are looking for

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Strangers, Xenops to invite them

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To be part of that group.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If we had three or four of those happening every other week,

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And if there were no guests, we can all cry.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, what a terrible Sabbath.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We had no guests.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Or we can say, Hallelujah, I can invite one of my other church friends that I don't know very well.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And we include somebody that wasn't prepared to be a guest that Sabbath.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And it it How can we

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Raise the bar, so to speak, on our hospitality level

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because while we may have the meet and greet, and I'm not talking bad about the meet and greet, that is good.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Hospitality does not stop there.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: What is the purpose of hospitality?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Christ's method alone will give true success in reaching the people

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The Saviour mingled with men as one who desired their good, he showed his sympathy for them, ministered to their needs, and won their confidence.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Then he bade them what

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Follow me.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: The purpose for hospitality is to build relationships so that we have a reason to call people to come and to follow Jesus.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Our church, our our church family.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I've got news for you.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We're in the hospitality business

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It's terrible when you go to a church and you read the rating that a church has

Pastor Dale Tunnell: on Yelp or Facebook or or whatever some of these other rating services.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And to read some of the comments about the church and to even read one negative comment hurts my heart.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: My thought is, oh, I sure am glad my church isn't like that.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I feel sorry for that place.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: In Hanoi, the church there was always getting reviewed.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We had guests in that church every Sabbath.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And many of them left us a review.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And oh, it hurt sometimes when the review was negative.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I know it doesn't happen so much here, but I just want to tell you, it happens.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And it shouldn't.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Friends, we as a church are in the hospitality business.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And I know what you're thinking.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Okay, Pastor, do something.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I did something

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I reminded us the example of Jesus.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Jesus is in the hospitality business

Pastor Dale Tunnell: If we are following the example of Jesus, we are in the hospitality business

Pastor Dale Tunnell: There in Hanoi I had some some individuals there that were wanting to start a restaurant.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because they thought that was the way to meet people and and get to know people in the community.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Because that's what Ellen White says is one of the entering wedges.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: To get into a community.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm telling you that because should we start a restaurant as an entering wedge to get into the community?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Have you ever been in the restaurant business?

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I'm telling you in the restaurant business, it's hard work.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean hard work

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I mean sun up to sundown work.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And then after the sun goes down, you gotta prepare for when the sun comes up.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I told him, you really don't want to start a restaurant.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Oh, I they did it anyway.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And God is blessing them.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: There are other ways to do hospitality than by starting a restaurant.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Our purpose is to get to know people, to mingle with them, as one who desires their good

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Jesus showed his sympathy for them, ministering to their needs.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: He won their confidence, and then he bade them follow me.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Hospitality is a very broad concept.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It spreads across many different personal interactions.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It spreads across professional services that are offered.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It spreads across initiative industry and practices.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Whether through a simple friendly smile, whether through a the handshake, w whether it's through the the vegetarian gourmet.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: buffet that we have for our fellowship dinner.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: That's what I would call it.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: Whether it's providing lodging, whether it's providing a unique experience for someone, hospitality creates memorable experiences for people.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: And they say, I like the way I felt when I was at that church.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I like the way I felt when I was around those people.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: As the family of God, we are in the hospitality business.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: It takes all of us, not just one of us

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We're the family of God.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: As his family, we need to be providing hospitality

Pastor Dale Tunnell: For the stranger.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: We need to be providing hospitality for one another

Pastor Dale Tunnell: I see the praise team coming up here.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: They're ready to sing.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: So I'll invite you to stand and sing, The Family of God.

Pastor Dale Tunnell: But keeping in mind hospitality to one another