Hospitality – opening our homes, and sharing our food with others – is a basic, practical, bodily doing of love. For Abraham and Sarah their hospitality to the mysterious visitors marks a turning point in their lives, as the gift of the child they thought they’d never have is promised. For Martha, however, the great gift of receiving Jesus into her home has a different kind of blessing – one of a challenge. The challenge comes from Jesus himself. He suggests that Martha is fussing about too many things. What are we to make of this challenge to Martha’s hospitable instincts and hard work? When we cook for guests, when we welcome people into our homes and share a bit of our lives with them, it is an act of practical loving not a performance of our own expertise. A simpler meal offered with care, which leaves room for the conversations of friendship, is more enabling of the doing of love than the extravagant feast that leaves some people exhausted and resentful, and can actually get in the way of real personal sharing.
Our world today is one where hospitality is a practice of love that is much needed. We are not called to grand gestures or lavish actions that we can take some pride in as the giver or the brilliant host. Rather, our giving is always, like Mary’s, to be centered on meeting the person whom we welcome. We need to learn to sit still with those we are called to care for, and listen to them know they are heard. In the week ahead let’s recognize the moments of hospitality that are opened up to us: buying a coffee for a workmate – and then spending some time chatting over it with them; inviting someone new to our homes – and getting to know them better; giving some food or money to the rough sleeper – and stopping to talk and listening to his or her story. If our generosity keeps the love of that person central, these moments of generosity will surely also be moments of meeting God.