Be My Burning Guest

I have come into my garden, my sister, my bride;
I have gathered my myrrh along with my balsam.
I have eaten my honeycomb and my honey;
I have drunk my wine and my milk.
Eat, friends; drink and imbibe deeply, O lovers.”

Last week, we learned:

“Of all the righteous ones of Scripture, Avraham and Sarah were the best known for hospitality to strangers, especially when they received the three angels. (So 5:1)

Good gardening is good hospitality to the voice of Adonai, His holy Presence. Because human beings, particularly believers walking in the Way of Yeshua, are in His image, practicing hospitality toward people of faith is an especially sweet fruit of the Ruach HaKodesh.”

Hospitality prepares us to be a part of the Garden of Eden conversation in the Scripture above. We can both invite the Bridegroom hospitably and remain in the Garden because we possess the vital character of hospitality without which a human cannot remain in the Garden. We can be a worthy guest…and friend…who will bless the Garden.

To get a better handle on this trait, let’s take a careful look at what hospitality is. What does the word mean?

Hospitality:

Middle English hospital, “residence for pilgrims and travelers, charitable institution providing residence for the poor and infirm,” “guest accommodations” (probably by ellipsis from hospit?le cubiculum “sleeping room for guests”), noun derivative of hospit?lis “of a guest, of hospitality, hospitable”

The Hebrew word for “guest” is kara ?????

The KJV translates Strong’s H7121 in the following manner: call (528x), cried (98x), read (38x), proclaim (36x), named (7x), guests (4x), invited (3x), gave (3x), renowned (3x), bidden (2x), preach (2x)

Outline of Biblical Usage
to call, call out, recite, read, cry out, proclaim
(Qal)
to call, cry, utter a loud sound
to call unto, cry (for help), call (with name of God)
to proclaim
to read aloud, read (to oneself), read
to summon, invite, call for, call and commission, appoint
to call, name, give name to, call by

The Book of Leviticus is “Vayikra” [“and called”], a book of holies, our calling to create a sanctuary of holiness for YHVH. This hospitality “preaches” His Presence to the earth and His desire to dwell with us. The Torah describes to us our holy “calling.” Not only that, Adonai listens to the cries / proclamations of human beings, especially the poor and distressed.

Somewhere in this world, your name can be proclaimed to Heaven, either in frustration, agony, and pain,
or in gratefulness, relief, and consolation.

How this works is that the needy “give name to” the situation in that home or community. A guest can “summon” Adonai’s attention for blessing or chaos. He will actually come investigate the call for Divine help or proclamation of gratefulness!

• Now the LORD appeared to Abraham by the oaks of Mamre, while he was sitting at the tent door in the heat of the day. When he raised his eyes and looked, behold, three men were standing opposite him; and when he saw them, he ran from the tent door to meet them and bowed down to the ground, and said, “My Lord, if now I have found favor in Your sight, please do not pass Your servant by. Please let a little water be brought and wash your feet, and make yourselves comfortable under the tree; and I will bring a piece of bread, so that you may refresh yourselves; after that you may go on, since you have visited your servant.” (Ge 18:1-5)

Avraham understood what a special opportunity he had. Without a guest, who would bless? Righteous guests are given a Divine mandate to bless or destroy a home. It’s an apocalyptic opportunity symbolic of the end of days.

Washing feet and providing a safe place to rest with food is the ancient practice of hospitality to guests, especially honored guests. Yeshua told his disciples to honor one another, not a new commandment, but an affirmation and demonstration of an old pattern of hospitality. It strengthens bonds of holiness and signals a desire to return to the ultimate place of hospitality, the Garden.

Abraham and Sarah’s [Pesach] hospitality was rewarded with a resurrection of their reproductive process.The messenger guest told them that they would have a son at the appointed time next year. The righteous guest has the Divine ability and OBLIGATION to bless a righteous host. In this respect, the blessing is mutual. The host blesses the righteous guest with three basic things, and the guest blesses the host with something that will bring shalom to the household. This is a Biblical pattern and principle.

• “Truly, truly, I say to you, a slave is not greater than his master, nor is one who is sent greater than the one who sent him. If you know these things, you are blessed if you do them.” (Jn 13:16-17)

Yeshua teaches the Garden principle of hospitality. With hospitality, one didn’t wash the whole visitor, but his feet. It is an act of extreme humility, making the benefactor the servant and the guest the recipient of unearned hospitality. Yeshua washed his disciples’ feet to demonstrate the principles:

• “You are My friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you slaves, for the slave does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all things that I have heard from My Father I have made known to you. (Jn 15:14-15)

This relationship with his disciples echoed El Shaddai’s relationship with Avraham, the father of hospitality, which was based on believing Elohim, Who credited him with righteousness. Hospitality to the angelic messengers (possibly a pre-incarnate visit with Yeshua) resulted in an actual friendship with the Creator of the Universe. (Is 41:8; 2 Ch 20:7; Ja 2:23)

As a result, Adonai revealed to Avraham not only the specific household blessing of having a son whom he would name Yitzchak, but the destruction of the five cities of Sodom. He didn’t want His friend to be caught off-guard in either the blessing or the destruction.

Likewise, Yeshua regularly updated his disciples on coming events, both good and bad. When he washed their feet at Pesach, he told them what was about to happen. From the hospitable foot-washing, Yeshua continues and points out the disciples who would betray him: the one who betrayed his hospitality of bread and rest at the seder:

• “I do not speak of all of you. I know the ones I have chosen; but it is that the Scripture may be fulfilled, ‘HE WHO EATS MY BREAD HAS LIFTED UP HIS HEEL AGAINST ME.’ From now on I am telling you before it comes to pass, so that when it does occur, you may believe that I am He. “Truly, truly, I say to you, he who receives whomever I send receives Me; and he who receives Me receives Him who sent Me.” When Jesus had said this, He became troubled in spirit, and testified and said, “Truly, truly, I say to you, that one of you will betray Me.” (Jn 13:19-21)

Yeshua is re-living the encounter with Avraham, a time when Avraham and Sarah would BELIEVE the promise and receive the power to conceive Isaac a few months later. Yeshua reiterates that when we receive a righteous guest, we receive the One who sent him or her, just as we receive the Father when we receive Yeshua.

When we show hospitality to a guest, our generosity welcomes the Presence of Elohim to His Garden. As He was the benefactor, yet served the undeserving creation, so we must restore our sense of hospitality to welcome Him first like a “guest” so that His Presence no longer must ascend and descend due to sin, idolatry, adultery.

Good hospitality creates a little sanctuary for blessing.

Good guests respect the sanctuary and bless the host’s service.

This is the fractal of the greater principle of the Sanctuary and the Garden; the host blesses the guest who blessed the host. This is the practice of the Temple:

Behold, bless the LORD, all servants of the LORD,
Who serve by night in the house of the LORD! Ps 134:1

O house of Israel, bless the LORD;
O house of Aaron, bless the LORD; Ps 135:19

O house of Levi, bless the LORD;
You who revere the LORD, bless the LORD. Ps 135:20
?
The LORD has been mindful of us; He will bless us;
He will bless the house of Israel;
He will bless the house of Aaron. Ps 115:12

A righteous guest seeks a righteous home for hospitality, and he/she has the authority to bless that home with peace:

• “Do not acquire gold, or silver, or copper for your money belts, or a bag for your journey, or even two coats, or sandals, or a staff; for the worker is worthy of his support. And whatever city or village you enter, inquire who is worthy in it, and stay at his house until you leave that city. As you enter the house, give it your greeting. If the house is worthy, give it your blessing of peace. But if it is not worthy, take back your blessing of peace. Whoever does not receive you, nor heed your words, as you go out of that house or that city, shake the dust off your feet. Truly I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city.” (Mt 10:9-15)         

What of INhospitality, though? Are there consequences for being inhospitable?

The answer to that question is found in the nine times “Sodom and Gomorra” are mentioned in the New Testament, or Brit HaChadasha. Yes, inhospitality is a thing. A very bad thing.

Sodom and Gomorrah were famously wealthy, greedy, inhospitable, murderous, and sexually perverted (more on that in a coming newsletter). They oppressed the guests and the needy, who cried out to their Creator at the inhospitality:

• And the LORD said, “The outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is indeed great, and their sin is exceedingly grave. I will go down now and see whether they have done entirely as the outcry, which has come to Me indicates; and if not, I will know.” (18:20-21)

When we are inhospitable and stingy, especially to righteous visitors or the poor and distressed, their cry has a direct line to the Heavenly ear. The Holy One WILL conduct a thorough investigation. In the case of Sodom and its daughter cities, the cries were not only accurately describing the inhospitality, but they were ENTIRELY accurate.

And the cities were burned. Destroyed with a spirit of burning.

• “For the LORD your God is a consuming fire, a jealous God.” (Dt 4:24)

In the verse above, it is in the context of the penalty for idolatry. Colossians 3:5 compares greed to idolatry. Inhospitality is like idolatry.

• “Know therefore today that it is the LORD your God who is crossing over before you as a consuming fire. He will destroy them and He will subdue them before you, so that you may drive them out and destroy them quickly, just as the LORD has spoken to you.” (Dt 9:3)

When a city is stingy, greedy, perverted, and sheds blood, it will be burned with fire eventually. The one thing Lot got right was a last-chance opportunity to be hospitable to the One Who burns with fire.

A righteous guest is to seek a righteous home for hospitality, and he/she has the authority to bless that home with peace. It says much that the angels at first declined to spend the night in Lot’s home. The spiritual ambiguity in his home made their reaction like the up-and-down visit to the Garden after Adam and Eve sinned.

Vayikra 6:13 says, “Fire shall be kept burning continually on the altar; it is not to go out.” Vayikra is our holy calling, our proclamation to the world that the House of Prayer for All Nations is a hospitable place for all to come meet the Bridegroom…while there is still time. How is our home fire burning for righteous guests and the needy? And is it hospitable to them?

Somewhere in this world, your name is proclaimed to Heaven,
either in frustration, agony, and pain,
or in gratefulness, relief, and consolation.