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The Holidays are upon us and they have turned into a major production. The vast majority of retail sales will take place during this coming month and hurried shoppers will rush about trying to find the “perfect gift” for that special someone. January is the highest month of returns and exchanges of the year. Go figure. My mother takes back every year almost every thing that my Dad buys her, but the ritual repeats itself. And give Dad credit -- he always messes up by buying a “too small size.” Dad’s pretty smart and I guess that’s why they’ve stayed married all these years!

There certainly is nothing wrong with celebrating Christmas, even though December is probably the wrong time of the year for Jesus’ birth. The Jews celebrated Hannukah by giving gifts in the winter time and Jesus participated in that. The Wise men gave Jesus gifts in Bethlehem. That’s where the tradition began and so certainly to buy a gift or celebrate Christmas is not a sin. In truth, Spirit-filled Christians who know who Jesus Christ is ought to welcome any opportunity to celebrate His birth, even if perhaps there are some who don’t really know the reason for the season.

Almost as important as the gift giving tradition is the tradition of holiday parties and celebrations. I don’t know to what extent your social party scene will be this holiday season. Maybe it’s limited to a company “party celebration” which rarely are such things, or maybe you invite your family or friends to a get together at your house. We have a friend in San Antonio that plans all year long for her annual Christmas party. Our church will have a Christmas banquet and the youth will also. You’ll either have no will power and gain weight this season or you will eat the carrots and stay the same. Incidentally, January is also the highest season for purchasing exercise equipment. There ought to be a lesson learned here somewhere.

In his hilarious book, Skipping Christmas, well-known author John Grisham tells the fictional tale about a couple on the East Coast whose daughter is not able to come home for Christmas for college so they decide to “skip” the festivities of the Christmas season. A week before Christmas, they will go on a two week cruise. They decide to not decorate their house and not put the big snowman on the roof like everyone in their neighborhood always does. They decide to skip the gifts. Part of the reason that they do so is to “save money.” The other reason is that want to skip “all those social parties.” I won’t ruin the book but will just tell you that it backfires when the entire neighborhood begins to try to get them to change their mind and even calls them un American and un Christian to not want to celebrate the holidays. As the husband in the book says “there’s nothing worse than trying to pretend that you’re glad to see someone that you really can’t wait until they are gone!”

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I agree to a point but there is something worse. It’s being invited somewhere and not made to feel welcome. You know what’s it like. You go somewhere and the entire time you feel out of place and awkward like you don’t belong. That’s a horrible feeling -- to not feel welcome and not receive hospitality befitting a welcome guest. Usually you leave such a place determined to never go back there again if you can help it. Most of you are thinking of a situation right now where you’ve experienced exactly what I’m talking about. Sorry to bring it up.

In the Old Testament, God commanded the Jewish people to go out of their way to make strangers feel welcome in their homes. God told Moses:

Things were different back then. In Biblical days, if a total stranger was passing through the town and decided to stay with you, then they would sit down on your doorstep. You were expected to open the door and invite them in, feed them and their animals, provide everybody a place to sleep and rest, and to entertain them. Furthermore, you were expected to do this as long as they cared to stay! And it was considered rude to not wait at least a few days before you asked them what their exact business was. When Job was trying to convince his friends that his trials were not because he was a bad person, one of the things that he pointed out to prove that he had lived right was:

Job said “I’ve always taken the stranger in and been a good host.” I understand that times have changed and it certainly is not wise to take in every stranger that comes to your door. Hotels are prolific now and besides, back then very few people traveled and then only because of a specific purpose and so having guests was a welcome change not an everyday occurrence in life. I understand that, but I want you to realize that being a good host was something important enough that God commanded it. We should be good hosts. We should make people feel welcome in our presence. We should never exclude someone because of our personal preferences or our dogma. He that will have friends must show himself friendly, and true friends are special so we must treat every stranger as a potential friend.

Fast forward to Jewish life in the time of Jesus Christ. Not only were you expected to take in a stranger and make them feel welcome, but there was some established things that made for good hospitality. You were expected to greet them heartily and actually act glad to see them as you welcomed them into your house. You were supposed to feed your guests the best food that you had. Since people wore sandals and people walked everywhere, you would provide a basin of water and a place to wash the dirt off. In those days, it was considering “refreshing” to take olive oil and rub the face and neck with it. To us it sounds sort of greasy, but to these people living surrounded by wilderness and desert with their skin dried out by the hot winds, it was a balm on their skin similar to the way we would use lotion today. Then, after all this was completed, you would wait hand and foot on your guests to make sure that they were comfortable. And you would guard your guests throughout the night as if they were your own family. Such was the traits and duties of a good host. They would go out of their way to make the guest feel welcome and secure.

God knew that there is nothing worse than being invited in and not made to feel welcome, and so the theme of hospitality is found throughout all of scripture, from Abraham’s taking in angels unawares in Genesis and the time of Job, through the Old Testament to the life of Jesus Christ, all the way to our text where Peter is writing to the Apostolic church about how to act in the last days and he said:

The word for “hospitality” here literally means “friend of strangers” and the Apostolic Church was known for it’s generosity and hospitality so much that the Apostles commanded that they be friendly and good hosts to each other, especially fellow Christians. There are Bible scholars who believe that 2^nd and 3^rd John were letters carried by traveling Christians to ensure that they received hospitality as a member of the church. From cover to cover we find the importance in the Bible of making others feel welcome. Even though the title refers to God’s rule over the angels, if you pardon the pun we could say that He is the “Lord of Hosts!”

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I bring all this up to point out that God obeys His Word. When we come to God’s house, He goes out of His way to make us feel welcome. He has never turned away even the worst sinner from His house or presence. The 23^rd Psalm is one of the most popular scriptures in the Bible but few realize that it is written about a person coming into the house of God and God playing the good host.

Not only does He welcome us into His presence, but God is always glad to see us and there’s always room for you at His place! You will want for nothing in His house. He will protect you from every enemy that’s after you. He’ll give you a quiet and beautiful place to rest until supper’s served. There’s not just a small basin but an entire river available for washing the dirt and grime of sin and life away! He’ll refresh you with the oil of His anointing. He’ll set a table for you to dine on the best spiritual food even if He has to do it in front of your enemies. You’ll be so full and blessed that you will have to say like the Psalmist “my cup runneth over.” And here’s the best part: the Psalmist ended his song by saying “I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.” God is such a good hostess that when you have eaten at His table and been refreshed with His oil and washed in His river and felt the security from being in His presence, then there was something that welled up in side of David and should arise in your spirit too that says, “I don’t ever want to leave this!” God’s been so good to me! It’s been so wonderful with God as my host, I want to stay here forever! And the great thing is that nowhere does it say that you have to leave His side! You can stay here as long as you want -- even for eternity!

In Luke chapter 4 at the beginning of Jesus’ ministry, He went back to Nazareth, the town that He had grown up. On the Sabbath day, He went to the synagogue. The Jews gathered together at the local synagogues to learn about Jehovah God. They weren’t expecting God’s presence to show up because under law His presence dwelled in the one temple in Jerusalem. They were expecting to read a few scriptures and talk about God and then go on their merry way. But this day would be different because Jesus was “Jehovah become salvation.” He was “God manifest in flesh.” And so Jehovah had come to the Nazareth synagogue this Sabbath in the form of the man called Jesus and we find that, as always, God wanted to be a good host.

Jesus went forward and took the scrolls when bidden and read in Isaiah 61:

When you on in that scripture you will find that the very next verses proclaimed:

They had come to the “house of the Lord” and this time Jehovah God was with them bodily! Jesus was going to be a good host! He welcomed them. And then offered to let His mighty Spirit bring deliverance to those captive by sin. He offered to heal them and bind up their wounds. He offered to feed them and make them feel welcome and safe and “at home.” He said that He would give them an “oil of joy” to be anointed with. He had a fresh change of garments for them with the “garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness!” This day, they had come to God’s house and they were finding out that He was a good host!

They didn’t receive it. He never got to verse 3 of the chapter in Isaiah because as soon as He said “this day this scripture is filled in your ears,” they rejected Him. They were greeted by the most gracious host in the world. He came not in judgment but in healing. He came not in wrath but in mercy and yet they rejected Him because to receive His blessings would require admitting that they needed Him. And so the host of hosts, was rejected. They missed out on the greatest party that they would have ever seen because they rejected His hospitality.

How about you today? You’re at God’s house. He’s a gracious host. He’s responded to you with His presence. You’re certainly welcome here! The offer to Nazareth is still available today. He can forgive your past. The waters of Baptism and the Living Water of the Holy Ghost still flow today and can wash the dirt and grime of life and sin away. There’s a spiritual table which has everything that you’ve been searching for free for the taking. There’s still the oil of joy available no matter what your situation. There’s still a garment of praise that you can change into, laying that heaviness and depression down that you walked in here with. As long as you are in His presence, you are safe and sheltered even if you have the worst possible enemy on your heels. He’s treating you so good in the hopes that you will get the attitude that David got: “I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever!” But even the greatest hospitality in the world is in vain if not received by the guests. Yes, to receive all that He’s offering you would be to admit that you need Him, but what will you do? Will you be like David, or like the doubters from Nazareth. The “Lord of Hosts” is here -- how will you respond to His hospitality?

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But there’s another side to this scriptural hospitability thing. It’s found in the fact that while God may play the host when we come to church and feel His presence, really His objective is not to live within these four walls that you see around you. That’s why His presence doesn’t manifest itself until someone ushers Him in by praising Him. God no longer wants to dwell within a wooden structure all alone, but now He wants your body to become the temple of the Holy Ghost. He wants to dwell within you. He wants to live within your life. You’ve got the home that God desires to live within.

Think about that for a moment. I’ve never had a president or such come to my home, but I can imagine how special that would be for someone of such power and prestige to visit. I would want only the best and warmest welcome. Even some of you who care less about etiquette, would be asking which fork to use if you found out that George W. Bush was dining with you tomorrow! And yet we have somebody much more important than the President of the United States that wants to stay with us! He’s the Lord of Glory, the Master of the Universe, the Prince of Peace! Our Savior and Messiah, the Creator of everything, the head of principalities and powers. We’re talking about someone wanting to dwell with us who created every president that’s ever took office! Jesus wants to dwell within your life as Lord of All but here’s the question: Do you make Him feel welcome in your life, or do you treat Him as an awkward outsider. It’s unthinkable, but for the remainder of this sermon let me remind you of the story in our other text where Jesus was a guest and wasn’t being made very welcome. Maybe we can learn something from this story on how to and how NOT to treat Jesus!

The story begins in Luke 7 at the 36^th verse. Jesus had already had a busy day. He had healed the centurion’s son. He had interrupted a funeral outside the town of Capernaum by raising the young man up from the dead. Multitudes from the city came to Him and were being healed and with them came the Pharisees -- the doubters and critics. They always show up at church too eventually!

When the smoke had cleared, one of the Pharisees invited Jesus to eat with him. The man’s name was Simon and from the story it’s clear that He is only inviting Jesus into His house out of a detached curiosity and because of the miracles rather than a real desire to know Him or serve Him. Pharisees were known for their excellent education and wealth and so no doubt the home and meal were superb. The scripture records that as they are sitting down to eat, something remarkable happens. A local sinner woman whom everyone in town knew was bad and unworthy and in no way religious somehow slipped in to the house. She carried only an alabaster box, which was a very expensive box of perfume reserved for wedding days and funerals and such. She wasn’t supposed to be there -- she certainly wasn’t invited, but she slipped in and as Jesus talked with Simon the Pharisee, to their surprise suddenly this woman appeared and broke the expensive box of ointment and poured it out on Jesus’ feet and began to dry them with her hair, a sign of submission and total worship.

As the Pharisee saw it, he thought to himself “if Jesus really were a true prophet, He would forbid this woman because everybody in town knows that she’s a no good sinner who has never been faithful to God in anyway.” And Jesus -- who knew his thoughts -- looked at Simon and said “Simon, if one man owed another $70 dollars and another owed him $7 and neither could pay the debt, and yet the lender forgave both of their debts, which one would love the lender the most and be the most thankful?” Simon, not realizing that Jesus was setting him up answered “the one who was forgiven the most would be the most grateful.

Then Jesus looked at the woman and said “Simon, see this woman? When I came into your house, you didn’t provide water for my dirty feet, but she’s washing my feet with her tears and hair. You didn’t even greet me or welcome me, Simon, but this woman has not ceased to kiss my feet. Simon, you didn’t provide any olive oil for my skin to refresh me before dinner, but this woman has brought something so precious that you would not even break it for your family and yet she has brought this precious oil and anointed me with it continually!”

And then Jesus uttered these famous words to the sinner woman at His feet:

Oh, how many lessons there are in just this one story! I could preach to you on how the devil tries to get you to think that those who have been “religious” all their lives are the ones that make the best saints and followers of Jesus, but Jesus would contradict that. All of us have a debt of sin that we cannot pay to God, but it’s those who realize the vastness of their debt that make the best followers of Jesus. Every month, I get someone to tell me “I’ve done too much and I’ve lived my life without God too long to be of any use to the kingdom of heaven, preacher.” Actually, if you realize that, then you are the type that makes the best saint, because when you realize that you have been forgiven much, you will also love much! The worst sinners -- when born again and changed by the power of the Holy Ghost and the cleansing blood of Jesus -- make the best saints!

Understand also that this doesn’t mean that we need to go out and sin some more so we can love God more. All of us are sinners from the best person to the worst. All of us fall short of the glory of God. The scriptures say that our righteousness are as filthy rags when compared to God’s glory (Isaiah 64:6). We quote that scripture all the time, and yet few of us really understand what it’s saying. In the Hebrew, the word for “filthy rags” refers to the menstrual cloths of the Hebrew women that were discarded each month outside the camp. That’s pretty nasty to think about, but God said that even the best person’s goodness is that compared to Him! In the story, neither the one who owed $70 nor the one who owed $7 could pay the debt so what was the difference? No matter how much you think your debt is to God, you’ve got a debt that you can’t pay from sin! All have sinned and come short of the glory of God!

The issue is not that we need to sin more, but that we need to get a better revelation of how great He is! When you really understand how perfect and holy God is, then even what would be to us a good life becomes filthy and tainted compared to Him! The principle is do you realize how much God has forgiven you? Your love for Him will be in direct proportion to the realization of how forgiven you are! And as this lady in scripture shows, our outward worship to God is how we show our love to Jesus. Jesus said that “she loveth much.” What had she done to show it? Sacrifice and worship! Where Simon was reluctant to give Jesus normal, ordinary, she was willing to give Him the most costly gift that she had and she was willing to give it so that she could worship Him!

Your worship shows your commitment and love for God. And so does the level of sacrifice that you are willing to give in order to worship. Think of all this woman sacrificed to worship Jesus. She knew that she would be criticized and misunderstood because of her past. She risked being humiliated and kicked out of the Pharisee’s house. She took the alabaster box something that probably had taken her over ten years of hard work to purchase and was certainly the most expensive thing that she owned and she broke it -- once broken it would never be used again -- just so she could worship. And so do you think when she finally got into His presence that she was going to give a half-hearted hand clap for Him and then rush out the door back to her daily business? Not on your life! It had cost her so much to just get there, that she was willing to worship Him in unorthodox ways and to stay as long as she would be allowed!

And yet today, many of us don’t really love Him with everything in us and it shows most in our worship. Worship is the way we make Jesus feel welcome in our life. And yet there are some of us who are very poor hosts to the King of Kings. Sacrifice an alabaster box? Some can’t even sacrifice setting the alarm and the few dollars gas that it takes to come to church regularly. Welcome Jesus in as He deserves? Like Simon, some of us slide into church as if Jesus is blessed for us to be there and we’ve done Him some great favor by making time for Him in our lives. As if we are the ones that more important than the Lord of Lords. Tears and drying His feet with our hair in an act of submission? Some of us shun the emotional stuff and prefer to sit starchily looking for something that we can criticize in other’s worship that is heart felt. We can clap our hands and sing our little songs and go out and talk about what everybody else did or didn’t do. And certainly don’t preach about submission, preacher. When you are satisfied with worship that leaves you unchanged and heaven unmoved and are more in a hurry to return to what you have planned for the remainder of the day than to be in His presence, then frankly, you haven’t sacrificed much to worship Him. And You haven’t made Him feel very welcome in your life. And it comes from either you really haven’t had your sins forgiven or you don’t think that you really needed God that much in the first place and so therefore you don’t really love Him as you should. But He who has been forgiven much, loveth much! What’s your worship reveal about your love for the Master today?

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The point of all of this is simple. Simon had a nice house and a good meal and the education and religion and good works to rival anyone. But he didn’t really make Jesus feel welcome. He didn’t greet Him with worship. He didn’t submit himself to the Master. He didn’t really go to any trouble or sacrifice in his hosting. The story proves that even the nicest arrangements do no good if they are not presented with a heart-felt welcome. The issue is not how good you are. It’s not your religious pedigree or how educated you are in the scriptures. If you have all of those things and don’t make Jesus welcome in your life, then He’s not going to hang around. He’s not going to do anything great. He’s not going to desire to come back anytime soon. He wants to be welcomed!

But for some of you I’ve got hope! It wasn’t her “turf” and it wasn’t her home. It wasn’t orthodox and it wasn’t socially acceptable. But that little woman was the one who truly made Jesus feel welcome! And here’s the lesson to be learned about spiritual hospitality: Jesus is more at home with a blatant, forgiven sinner who worships than the most righteous person who doesn’t know how to make God feel welcome. Jesus is not concerned with how religious you are right now, He’s just concerned with how welcome you ill make Him in your life. He wants to know if you are willing to get beyond the masks. To push aside any fear of persecution of what others might say. To get beyond the shame of your past. To prove to Him that you are willing to give Him everything -- no matter what the cost. The worst sinners make the best worshippers. But only when they are willing to submit to Him with the same reckless abandon that they submitted to sin. But your potential is only realized by making Him feel welcome and coming to His feet. You will only be changed when you submit to Him.

I think that one more scripture is appropriate here. It’s in Revelation chapter 3 where Jesus said:

God is a good host, that’s not even a question. He always welcomes us and blesses us beyond measure. He’s the Lord of Hosts, but the question is how will we welcome the Lord of Hosts who wants to come in an fellowship with us? Will you let Him in? He knocking. If you do let Him in, then whatever you do, make Him feel welcome! Doing so, you’ll find that He’ll never leave you nor forsake you. And His presence in your life will change it so that it’s never the same again!