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What about Hospitality?

I’ve had some ideas and thoughts and God-nudges about hospitality lately.
Lots in fact.
I haven’t shared because I’m not quite sure how to put it all into words.
And I still don’t.
I’m a big fan of hospitality. I’ve been told that I have the gift of hospitality.
I am even the Hospitality Coordinator for my local MOPS group.
And yet I’m learning that I need to stretch myself a bit more in this area.
Like I said- I’ve been getting God-nudges.
Bottom line that I must admit to myself is that I enjoy giving hospitality to those who enjoy receiving my hospitality. In other words, I relate well to those who relate well to me.
Ahem- excuse me, but it still hurts a bit to admit that.
I’m usually quite okay with admitting that I am basically a selfish person. But for some reason this hospitality issue has a bit more bite to it.
I love to make little gift bags of little goodies to give to friends.
I like to bring a little something for the hostess whenever we have dinner with friends.
I find joy in sending cards- cards of encouragement, congrats, thinking of you and other acknowledgements.
I enjoy putting together a meal to take to a new mom. And I almost always include a little card with a packet or two of a spa foot soak or cream.
I love putting together get-togethers at my home for friends and family.
BUT
[Ah, you knew the big but was coming . . . .!]
There are more ways to show and share hospitality.
And sometimes what I think is hospitality is more in line with entertaining. And yes there is a difference- it’s a difference of the heart.
Again- there are more ways to show and share hospitality.
More ways for God to nudge someone out of their comfort zone.
What could possibly be out of my comfort zone hospitality-wise?
Don’t laugh but it may strike you as odd.
But by BIG BUT is my neighbors.
I have a hard time showing hospitality to those who live right nearby me.
Sigh. That was tough to write. I said this was biting me and it is.
We don’t have the best of neighbors all around.
We’ve got a set of wonderful ones.
A set that are friends.
And then there are THE OTHERS.
There have been lots of OTHERS over the years. When we first moved we found out that the house to the north and the one kitty-corner southwest- well both houses were under police surveillance for dealing drugs.
Then there was the living-together couple that were often having large drunken yelling matches in their front yard in the middle of the night.
Then the couple directly across the street who wanted us to sign a court document about who we saw playing and interacting with the children more since they were now in a bitter divorce/custody dispute.
Let’s not forget the one’s directly behind us who let their dog run loose and “deposit” gi-normous mounds of you-know-what in our yard- right next to the kiddos’ swing set. And put their trash in our trash hopper.
Or the ones who moved in after them who continually parked in our yard- without asking-  in front of our garage/barn (where Mr. Steady parks)— going so far as to park beside Mr. Steady’s car where he had spent back-breaking time shoveling snow this past winter.
These are just the highlights- there are more stories but you get the drift.
Plain and simple- I’m not too fond of the neighbors.
Which leads me to not being altogether neighborly.
Which has led to some grand failings in the times I’ve actually tried to be neighborly—which led to me wanting to be quite a bit less neighborly.
What? For instance— a few years ago, I was trying to make friends with the then-new family across the street but she kept telling my other neighbor (our friends) that I was a cold snobby *b-bleep*. As you could well imagine, I took offense to this.
And tried to go out of my comfort zone (and my reaction of wanting to just ignore her) to be nice. I made sure to smile, wave and call out “Hello” whenever outside (one of her complaints about me being snobbish was that I didn’t do this- never mind that she didn’t initiate this neighborly “hello” business either- but I digress). Then there came her yard sale and her big blow-up. We park my car in front of our home on the street. I figured that it would be the neighborly thing to do to park the car in the side yard so that people stopping at the yard sale could park right out front. Having had yard sales in the past and seen other neighbors have yard sales I knew that some people would just pull up and park in my side yard. Mr. Steady didn’t want this as we were trying to re-grow some grass in the area right next to where we would park our car during the sale. So he put out a small staked sign that stated “Please No Parking Here”.
The neighbor lady went ballistic.
I went into hiding. No more trying to make nice with the neighbors.
Too hard.
I could share other lessons learned . . . . Suffice it to say- I’ve failed miserably at being “neighborly” over the years. And it is just me. Mr. Steady does just fine- he sees a neighbor loading something big in their van and rushes over to help quick, he mowed another neighbor’s yard a couple of times when the man broke his ankle, he’s helped haul dirt for another and on and on. He’s taken our kids and our overflow of cucumbers and doled them out (the cukes not the kids- they were his produce haulers). He doesn’t struggle with being neighborly. He just is.
And he is quite perplexed by my obvious struggle.
Sometimes it’s a sincere struggle just for me to wave and say hi. I can’t explain it- it just is what it is.
And so how does this come back around to hospitality and God-nudges? I have been feeling nudged (more like jabbed with a sharp elbow in my soft fleshy side) by God to be more hospitable to my neighbors.
My reaction? Kind of like Moses- “Me Lord? You’ve got to be kidding? You don’t want me to do this! I’ve failed so miserably in the past- don’t you remember the fiascos? Are you sure this is what you want me to do? Don’t you know how far this takes me out of my comfort zone?”
And God laughs. He has a wonderful sense of humor, dontcha know.
So what’s a girl to do?
To be continued . . . .

Untitled Comment

3:37 PM, 2008-Jun-25 .. Posted by sweetie

God indeed created comedy....and I believe its one His best gifts (personally, His own!) After all, He has put a broken girl like me in this world to help other broken folks.....You have a gift for sharing girlie and I don't just mean clothes or food baskets! Thanks for being you!
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