“Sit down and let me make you some tea,” were the words I heard as I continued to move the heavy items up the stairs to the bedroom of this woman’s new boarder. I had been called after softball practice to help a friend of ours move into a new place as a border. The woman who owned the home wanted everyone who was helping to sit down for tea and sweets, a rolled cookie or ice cream, as soon as we finished, but I had other plans. After I finished helping our friend move I wanted to go visit the kids “Park Day” at Shannon Park. I always get a kick out of the games kids play, which some times they let me join, and I always enjoy the opportunity to talk and laugh with the other adults present.
I had an agenda and it didn’t include stopping to chat with someone over tea. I was anxious to leave, but God, through my wife, was reminding me hospitality is a two way street, yes it is often when we give others something but it also includes being respectful and gracious to someone who offers you hospitality.
As I listened to the conversation over tea I learned first, this tea was from this lady’s brother’s tea plantation. It was like a green tea, but more mild, like a nice merlot before dinner. Secondly, she had come to the US at age 23 with three children from Vietnam. It had taken her five attempts. You see she had gone to jail the first four tries. She had paid people to help her leave those five times, but the first four they had taken the money, but then they contacted the authorities and she was carted off to jail.
She was leaving Vietnam because she had lost her husband in the war and she wanted to make a new life for herself and her children in America. Her tenacity to leave continued once here for it not only brought her to the US it also helped her secure a good job and also now she has more than the house to her name besides she one she lives in.
Her's was a truly amazing story and the tea was good too.
This summer, as I try to practice the hospitality God expects of us, I learned that hospitality is not only in giving, but also something we can receive.
Learning to receive in a gracious manner, even when I don’t want to,
Pastor Randy
