Christmastime is a time where we tend to practice hospitality maybe more than other times of the year, so I have been thinking about this a little more the past few days. Josh and I recognize this as one of the gifts God has given us that we both share, and it is fun for us to have the opportunity to practice this gift together. Especially in Chad, we have many opportunities to host people in our home and show hospitality – both to Chadians and fellow workers from the West.
I was remembering with thanksgiving the ways that God has allowed us to use our home to show hospitality to others this past year. Abeche is a town many people travel through, but there are not many places for people to stop for the night if needed.
Before we ever moved into our home, a Chadian believer was occasionally sleeping in our compound on his way to and from other towns. Then, the week before we moved, we hosted a volunteer team from America who slept at our house (we were still living at the Orphanage guest housing in our town).
Since living in our home, we have hosted a Chadian family overnight for several days; fed lunch to countless men who worked to make our house a home; hosted a western NGO worker for a water drilling organization several different times overnight; hosted a man who lived here for 10 years working on Bible translation but who currently works from the States; hosted another Bible translator and church planter who lives a few hours from us; turned a spare room on our compound into a “studio apartment” for our nanny and teammate, Danielle; hosted the Blackfords who came on a vision trip and then decided to join our team; hosted two men, Ben and Matt, from our home church; and this coming week while we are still in N’Djamena, a new team in country will be staying at our house for several days while they make plans to move to Abeche in the near future.
In addition to providing a roof, a mattress, and at least a meal or two to all of these people, we were also able to use our spare room as a language learning space for another worker in our town.
I am excited that we are able to use the home God provided us to bless many other people as they go about the His work in our area. I pray this continues, and I am certain it will. We already have two or three groups from America scheduled to come out next year – all these will be for the purpose of mobilizing the church in America to missions in Chad.
Do you have the gift of hospitality? Do you find you can use it more during a certain season of the year? How do you hope to show hospitality this coming year in a way that furthers God’s kingdom? I’d love to hear how you practice hospitality in your own home!