The Timeless Blessing of Hospitality: A Feast for the Least.
It is early on Saturday morning. With the rising sun come whiffs of smoke from small cooking fires and the complex aroma of boiling basmati rice, curry chicken, and gravies made of meats, vegetables, and spices. Onions are being browned with ghee. Raisins, beans, and chickpeas are ready. Ministry partners chat pleasantly as they work together, stirring large pots and erecting canopies to shade the guests who soon will gather.
Is this a banquet to celebrate a wedding? A birthday party? No. It’s a feast for the least.
The significance of this event grows when we see it in its ancient context. Genesis 18 tells the story of Abraham and his response to three strangers who come toward his tent one very hot day. As they approach, he does not duck into his home and bring out a weapon to defend himself.
Instead of hostility, he shows them hospitality. He dashes over to welcome them, and invites them to enjoy his acceptance and kindness. His servants wash their feet, he provides shade, and he prepares a delicious desert feast. Only then does he discover that they are messengers from God—one of them God pre-incarnate.
Centuries later, God inspires David to write Psalm 23. In verse five, the loving Shepherd-King serves a lavish banquet to His enemy-surrounded follower. His public respect for and friendship with David tells friend and enemy alike to be careful: David is under God’s protective eye.
Centuries after that, Jesus Christ makes breakfast for His tired fishermen beside the Sea of Galilee.
Such hospitality, whether for strangers (Genesis 18) or followers (John 21), shows acceptance, respect, and relationship. This is particularly significant for children and youth who are spurned or abused through such tragedies as death of parents, abandonment, poverty, disease, or homelessness. Who will offer them protection, acceptance, respect, employment, or friendship? Their need is the heartbeat of Psalm 35:10 and Proverbs 21:13.
Each “feast for the least” we provide reaches out to “the least of these” (Mt. 25:40). They may be abused, ignored, or spat upon the day before or after that feast, but that day we honor them with hospitality. In the presence of those who snub them, we invite them as friends, respect them as individuals, and introduce them to Jesus.
The menu may vary from Africa to Asia, but the goal is the same: Demonstrate God’s love practically, and proclaim how “God so loved the world.”
Are you “in”? Will you reach out this month through your prayers and gifts, to bless thousands of children through these feasts for the least?
