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We're going to read an entire
book of the Bible, 3 John, from our risen Lord. The elder to
the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth. Beloved, I pray that
you may prosper in all things and be in health just as your
soul prospers. For I rejoiced greatly when brethren
came and testified of the truth that is in you, just as you walk
in the truth. I have no greater joy than to
hear that my children walk in truth. Beloved, you do faithfully
whatever you do for the brethren and for strangers who have borne
witness of your love before the church. If you send them forward
on their journey in a manner worthy of God, you will do well
because they went forth for his namesake, taking nothing from
the Gentiles. We therefore ought to receive
such that we may become fellow workers for the truth. I wrote
to the church, but Theotrophes, who loves to have the preeminence
among them, does not receive us. Therefore, if I come, I will
call to mind his deeds which he does, prating against us with
malicious words and not content with that. He himself does not
receive the brethren and forbids those who wish to, putting them
out of the church. Beloved, do not imitate what
is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God, but
he who does evil has not seen God. Demetrius has a good testimony
from all and from the truth itself, and we also bear witness, and
you know that our testimony is true. I had many things to write,
but I do not wish to write to you with pen and ink. But I hope
to see you shortly, and we shall speak face to face. Peace to
you. Our friends greet you. Greet
the friends by name. Amen. Father, I thank you for
this, your word, and I pray that as we dig into it, that our hearts
would be grabbed by your Holy Spirit and drawn into the same
hospitality that you have shown to us as you have invited us
to this banqueting table, as you have said in the end of Revelation,
the Spirit and the Bride say come and let him who is a thirst
come. May each of us, Father, have this same invitational attitude,
and we pray it in Jesus' name, amen. Well, last week I pointed
out that both 2 and 3 John were personal letters that were being
written to a head of a household. 2 John was written to a single
mom from a broken family. And 3 John was written to a man
called Gaius who apparently had taken a major hit financially
and a major hit to his health, and scholars have deduced that
from three facts. First of all, John, as has been
mentioned a couple times in this service, prayed that he would
gain health, which implies that he didn't have it. He prays that
he would prosper in all things, implying that there was lack
that was there. That's the first fact. The second
fact is that John has to tell Gaius about some pretty bad things
that are happening in the church that he is attached to, of which
Diotrephes apparently is the lead elder. And that implies
that Gaius has not been to church for a while, otherwise why does
he have to be informed of what is going on? And that further
implies that he lived far enough away that his health prevented
him from making this trip to the church. Third, this is further
confirmed by the fact that deiotrophies had excommunicated several people
in verses 9 through 10 for engaging in exactly the same hospitality
that Gaius has been engaged in, and yet Gaius is not excommunicated. And so trying to fit these pieces
together These scholars have deduced that he probably lived
far enough away from the church that his health problems prevented
attending and also prevented him receiving news as frequently
as might otherwise have been the case. And what I want to
do right now is I want to give you a three minute overview of
the whole book so that you can see the context. As I mentioned
earlier, verses 1 and 14 show that this was a private letter
to an individual, just like 2 John was, and this particular letter
was intended to encourage the continuation of proper hospitality,
in verse 8, to thank Gaius for the hospitality he's already
shown in verses 3, 5, and 6, and to vindicate the name of
Demetrius as being a candidate who was worthy of hospitality,
verse 12. So he's introducing yet another
missionary that Diotrephes has rejected and that John is asking
Gaius, we need help for. John had sent out some missionaries
in verse 6 accompanied with an explanatory letter, and this
frequently happened. They would give letters of reference
to various churches. And this explanatory letter was
sent to Deiotrophes, who perhaps was the lead elder of the church
that Gaius was connected to, verse 9. However, Diotrephes
rejected John's letter, verse 9, refused to extend hospitality,
verse 10, and actually kicked people out of the church for
extending hospitality to these missionaries that John had sent.
That's verse 10 as well. John chalks all of this abusive
behavior up to pride and arrogance, verse 10. Now, why would pride
and arrogance enter in? Well, some commentators have
tried to read between the lines based upon his name. Diotrephes
is a very rare name in the first century that was only used of
aristocrats, and so they conjecture that he had such high social
standing that it was just improper in terms of the way the world
thought for him to be submitting to a peasant like John, and John
was socially way below him. He just refused to do that. Whether that's the case or not,
and it is a conjecture, I will admit that, but it seems like
a reasonable one, The text is quite clear that Diotrephes is
an abusive and prideful elder. He stands as a warning to all
of us leaders as to what pride can do to destroy our ministry. I've got a bunch of Dilbert cartoons
in the back of your outlines that illustrate six other leadership
problems with Diotrephes. I was gonna get into that. I'm
just gonna skip over that this morning. But, in any case, John
was concerned that this abusive overreach on the part of Diotrephes
might completely dry up hospitality within the church. Just in case
Gaius himself might be tempted to stop extending hospitality,
that had been his habit, once he finds out what Diotrephes
is going to say. He tells him, Deotrephes does
not have authority to be doing this, no authority to forbid
this hospitality whatsoever. And John gives three references,
witnesses to the integrity of these missionaries, and he promises
that as a representative of Presbytery, he's going to make sure that
Deotrephes comes under church discipline. Leaders who abuse
the sheep, need to be dealt with. Now sadly in many modern churches
that is not the case. Abusive leaders get away with
their abusive behavior with impunity. But the very fact that John expects
Gaius to extend hospitality, even though he is poor in health,
does not have a lot of money, has a lot of other issues and
problems facing him, shows how central hospitality is to the
Christian faith. It complements 2 John in that
respect. So that's kind of an overview
of the whole book. And the heart of the book, which
is a chiasm, The heart of the book is not leadership. It's
a call to hospitality. I was planning to emphasize more
the leadership so that we had a balance between 2 and 3 John.
But I decided to be faithful as I've been going through each
of these books and trying to capture the essence of that book. I'm gonna stick to the central
theme of hospitality, and it's gonna mean I'm gonna duplicate
some things, at least, that I've preached on in the past when
we've looked at this book. Now, the Bible treats hospitality
as an absolutely essential characteristic of all Christians. Let me repeat
that. The Bible as a whole, not just
2 and 3 John, but the Bible as a whole from Genesis to Revelation
treats hospitality as an absolutely essential ingredient of true
Christianity. For example, in Romans 12, 9
through 21, he gives a listing of all of the things that every
Christian should be characterized by. Now most of those you'd say,
oh yeah, sure, I can see why Christians need that. But part
of it was distributing to the needs of the saints, and it says,
given to hospitality. He says that's what a true Christian
should be doing, be given to hospitality. And we need to ask
ourselves, am I given to hospitality? If not, why not? It is certainly
a requirement of officers in 1 Timothy 3 and Titus chapter
1. People shouldn't even apply to
the offices of elder or deacon if they are not given to hospitality. It is my belief that no stranger
should be able to come through the doors of this church without
receiving a warm welcome and some hospitality. We'll define
what that means in a little bit. Not just from the elders and
the deacons, but hospitality from every member in the church.
First Peter 4.9 commands believers, be hospitable to one another
without grumbling. So even our attitudes need to
be sanctified by grace so that they are hospitable attitudes,
without grumbling, he says. Hebrews 13 verse 2 says, Do not
forget to extend hospitality, for by so doing some have unwittingly
extended hospitality to angels. And I could go on and on with
many references from Genesis through Revelation that form
the background to 3 John. And so I want to repeat that
statement again so it's crystal clear in your mind. The Bible
treats hospitality as an absolutely essential characteristic of all
Christians, old and young. So don't write the sermon off
as irrelevant to you. It is very, very relevant to
you. And before we dig into this marvelous
book, let me define a Greek word. that occurred in each of the
verses I've just read from Paul's writings. It's the Greek word
phyloxenia. If you actually look at your
bulletins, it's written right under the first picture up on
the top right. Phyloxenia is made up of two
Greek words. There's phylao, which is friendship,
love, and then there's xenia, which is a stranger. And it may
seem like an oxymoron to put those words together, because
the first word indicates a very warm relationship between friends,
and the second word is the exact opposite. It's a stranger, somebody
whom you do not even know. But when you put those two words
together, you get the meaning of hospitality. And it's a shame that the New
King James translates it sometimes as to entertain. Because in my
mind, there is a big difference between entertainment and hospitality. They both have their place. We
love both. but they are quite different.
The word phyloxenia refers to someone who is a stranger. It's just a pouring out of your
life into someone else's life who is a stranger so that he
no longer feels like a stranger. He is welcomed in to see the
real you. Now contrast that with entertainment. Entertainment is opening your
home to somebody who is a stranger to your home and doesn't really
know what your home looks like on a day-to-day basis. So there
is some similarity between entertainment and hospitality on that note.
But he may get invited in once a year, maybe he comes over for
your Thanksgiving meal or something like that. It's a special occasion
when you've had a chance to really plan for something special, but
he's still a stranger to what your home normally looks like. And he remains a stranger when
he leaves your home. The only people who really know
what your home looks like are your immediate relatives and
maybe some close friends. You could entertain a person
several times, and he might still be a stranger to your home, which
would be a contradiction to the meaning of phyloxenia. Let me
try to paint a picture of at least some of the nuanced differences
between entertainment and the real meaning of this word, where
the person sees the real you. This may be a slight exaggeration,
but in my mind, entertaining is putting on a big production
that is exhausting. It might involve bringing out
the cloth napkins and napkin rings and fine china and food
designed to impress, and it takes you all day to cook that. Nothing
wrong with that. Carpet gets clean because you'd
be embarrassed for the guests to realize how dirty your carpet
gets. And maybe you buy new furniture. And maybe you ship the kids off
to grandpa's house because you're afraid that they're going to
spill something on the guests or act their normal bratties.
No, that would not be true of any of the kids here, right?
But anyway, the point is, you want it to be really, really
special, and so you've got a little bit of an artificial environment
designed to some degree to impress, but also to minister to people.
But it's an artificial environment, it's not your real home. To the
guests, it is not a close friend relationship, but rather a special
occasion relationship. And I've already mentioned, both
are okay. But they're different. So that's
the first word picture, the picture of entertaining. You can't afford
to do that every day because you'd be exhausted. But when
you extend hospitality, phyloxenia, a person who is a stranger to
your home very quickly becomes a friend and he becomes at ease
in your home. You make him feel relaxed. Okay,
that's the meaning of hospitality. This word implies you're inviting
people into your life, even with all of its messiness. Doesn't
mean I'm excusing you for not cleaning, vacuuming your carpet,
you know, occasionally. They come into your life the
way it is. In fact, when you're taking them to the dining room,
you might have to kick some toys out of the way that just got
dropped five minutes before by your kids, right? But you're
relaxed, and you immediately make your guests relaxed and
feel like they are at home. Now, that's not to say, again,
that there's no place for entertaining and putting on a big spread.
We love doing that, too. We love doing both. But the day-in
and day-out hospitality that God calls all believers to is
a much more down-to-earth and real experience. And when you
look at all that the Bible includes under the concept of hospitality,
it covers a boatload of things. Now let me just translate it
into modern terms. It could cover things as simple
as writing a card to somebody to cheer them up and to make
them feel wanted. and like they belong, to maybe
inviting somebody over for a meal. It could be as simple as making
people feel at home when they come through the doors of this
church. That's a kind of hospitality. Or it could be much more costly,
where you put them up for board and room for two or three weeks. And to one extent or another,
every Christian is called to be involved in at least some
kind of hospitality. Some are going to be especially
gifted at it. But in verse 5 of 3 John, Gaius is commended for
what he calls faithful activities, his faithful hospitality to the
brethren and to strangers alike. And so for the rest of this sermon,
what I want to do is I want to open up three things that need
to be in place if there is to be faithful hospitality. And
I should have numbered these. outlines. I almost redid them,
but these three points are in Roman numerals 2, 3, and 5. I
kind of numbered them weird, but... The first point is that
it needs to flow from the heart. Without a hospitality heart,
you really are gonna lose something in the hospitality. We'll explain
that. And the second, it must be self-giving or self-sacrificing. It's a giving of yourself in
some way. And then third, it must be discerning. We cannot naively give hospitality
to everybody, and 2 John dealt with that as well. So let's dig
into those three points. First, faithful hospitality flows
from the heart. That's the key and most important
condition. Now, many Christians wait for
other conditions to be fulfilled before they extend hospitality.
They want to have more time, more money, more help. better
health, better house, better furniture, better dishes. I mean,
one thing or another makes them put off the hospitality that
they want to engage in, but they think, oh, you know, I'm just
not quite ready for that at this point. But in contrast to all
of the reasons we could have for procrastination, the Bible
says the primary prerequisite is a change in the inner man,
a different perspective on this subject. God's grace gives us
a love for connecting with people in this unique way. It's not
just a change of the outer circumstances. If you have the heart, it does
not matter what your circumstances are, you will find a way to be
hospitable guaranteed if your heart is in it. Now we can see
that Gaius's was in it because he didn't have health or wealth
or supportive leadership or any of the outward helps. Verse two
says, beloved, I pray that you may prosper in all things and
be in health just as your soul prospers. Now I preached an entire
series of sermons on that verse and we branched off into the
rest of scripture. There's a lot packed in it, but I just want
to focus on one thing. The fact that John prays that
Gaius might gain health and prosperity implies that Gaius had been in
poor health and was not particularly wealthy. and he didn't have other
things, you know, prosper in all things, it says. Yet he engaged
in hospitality anyway because his heart was healthy. His soul
was prospering so much it automatically overflowed in hospitality. It's a prospering soul. I pray
that you may prosper in all things and be in health just as your
soul prospers. The next obstacle was that the
elders didn't model hospitality. How do I know that? Well, verse
nine says, I wrote to the church But Diotrephes, who loves to
have the preeminence among them, does not receive us. Okay, so
Diotrephes is not modeling hospitality. There was an atmosphere in the
church that actually was downright hostile to hospitality. And verse
10 makes that clear. It says of Diotrephes, the pastor,
he himself does not receive the brethren and forbids those who
wish to putting them out of the church. So really the result
was that the church was becoming an ingrown click. Third, we can
see it in the ways that Gaius got around his obstacles. John
rejoiced in the sacrificial hospitality that Gaius had previously engaged
in, in verse 3. He praises him for his faithfulness
and hospitality in verse 5. In verses six through eight,
John heard testimonies from others of Gaius' hospitality. I mean,
people are just blown away by how welcoming this man was. So
somehow, Gaius had been able to work around his limitations. Now, of course, John sees them
as limitations, and he prays they'll be removed. Praise God.
God's not against wealth and health and having a great house
and everything like that. But his lack illustrates the
fact that it was his heart that was the key to whether hospitality
would occur or not. Kathy and I love Karen Main's
book, Open Heart, Open Home, The Hospitable Way to Make Others
Feel Welcome and Wanted. But it's the first part of that
title that I think shows this essential ingredient, open heart
open home, okay? It's not until our hearts are
wide open that our homes feel wide open when people get invited
over to our homes, okay? The heart really makes a huge,
huge difference. Now, this past week, the elders
and the deacons were engaged in self-examination on, we're
using the book Lead by Paul David Tripp. That is a remarkable book.
I haven't finished it yet, but what we have been reading so
far, it's just absolutely fabulous. But I was struck right in the
introduction with an interesting phrase that he used for approachability. He said, humility is about firing
your inner lawyer. Others had heard that, I've never
heard that expression before. I thought, wow, that is a cool
expression because you know what the inner lawyer is. It's something
inside of you that defends you. and tries to make you feel like,
oh, I didn't do anything wrong. No, that's not me. You got me
completely wrong. You know, it's justifying. And
so he was saying we need to fire that inner lawyer of self vindication,
self serving pride, self focus, excuses, etc. Well, what I'm
going to say this morning is we need to have the same attitude
when it comes to hospitality. We can come up with all kinds
of reasons why we cannot extend hospitality, and we say, no,
no, no, I'm firing that inner excuse maker. We're going to
do what God calls us to do, and we're going to love it. The next
characteristic of faithful hospitality, this is Roman numeral three,
is that it is self-sacrificing in its expression. It really
is a giving of ourselves. Of course, that immediately makes
some people not interested. Okay, they're selfish. The scripture
indicates that everyone who has tasted of God's grace begins
to have this servant's heart. And what is so cool about this
is that you can extend hospitality like this. I mean, you can share
yourself, even if you're dirt poor. It's not dependent on your
circumstances. You share yourself. You're not
sharing things, you're sharing yourself. In fact, the sacrificial
nature of hospitality becomes far more obvious when we are
poor. God sees it in a highlighted
way. Anyway, we can see this characteristic
in verses 5 through 10. Now let me illustrate how you
can have this sacrificial heart even when you have nothing. Let's just pretend that you're
in a hospital dying of cancer, or you're in the hospital for
whatever reason, You probably do not feel like being hospitable
to the nurses and the doctors and visitors who are coming into
your room. And yet, if God has changed your heart into a heart
of hospitality, that's the previous point, right? You will want to
sacrificially put aside for the moment, while those people are
coming into your room, your pain and misery and complaining and
other symptoms so that you can be at least somewhat pleasant
to be around. Your heart will move you so much
to this next point of sacrificial giving that nurses, doctors,
and visitors will notice your welcoming demeanor and smile. They will want to come into your
room. Why? Because there is something infectious
about your hospitable demeanor. But it would take the sacrificing
of your feelings for a person to be that way. I gave this illustration
just to illustrate there's no excuse for any Christian to not
be hospitable, even if you're in a hospital, right? Unless
you're in a coma. Okay, you're excused if you're
in a coma. But let's dig into this point. This book gives four
illustrations of hospitality's self-sacrificing nature, and
I think these are remarkable illustrations. Verse 5 says,
Beloved, you do faithfully whatever you do for the brethren and for
strangers. Now, let's focus on the strangers
part of that clause because if you're You have strangers that
come to your home overnight, and then they leave, and you
never see them again. You're extending hospitality not so
that you can get something in return. There is no return whatsoever. And actually, that was the case
with the brethren as well. For strangers, it's obvious,
but these brethren were not known by Gaius. He has to be introduced.
That's why they had letters of introduction. They're probably
going to come. They may or may not come again,
but there's probably no way that these missionaries are going
to return the favor and extend hospitality to you. Now, that's
the point. We're not certain why deatrophies
did not accept them, but Gaius was extending hospitality to
castoffs and unknown at that. Now, we saw last week that there
is a boatload that we could say about the limits of church authority
and how this is abusive leadership, and we could get into that. But
here it illustrates that Gaius didn't extend hospitality in
hopes that they would return the favor. Probably no way they
could. Second evidence of this self-sacrificing
nature. is found in the Greek word for
love. Verse six says, who have borne witness of your love before
the church. Now the word for love there is
agape, which by now you all know is self-sacrificing love. It's
supernatural love that God gives to us. People will quickly sense
when we are extending hospitality because it is expected versus
whether we're doing it out of love. The first is focused on
the task, The latter is focused on the person. Let me just illustrate
using the two sisters, Martha and Mary. in the Gospel of John. Martha was really flustered and
frustrated because she was so focused upon the tasks that were
not getting done, whereas Mary really captured the essence and
the heart of hospitality because she was having the reach of the
heart to the person, okay? Now, we have to have service
and there's sacrifice involved in both. But if we are sacrificing
out of love for the person, it changes your perspective. It
gives you a joy in doing this. It flows from God's grace. And
again, it reinforces the first point that it's a heart issue.
A third sub-point is that it is a God-centered activity in
its focus. It is done as if you were doing
this hospitality for God himself, as if you were inviting God over
for dinner. Now you do a quality job if that
was the case It'd be pretty exciting if Jesus could come over for
lunch to your house. I mean you would really try to
put your all into giving your heart to him and make him feel
at home. Well, verse six says, if you
send them forward on their journey in a manner worthy of God, you
will do well because they went forth for his namesake, taking
nothing from the Gentiles. Well, if we engaged in hospitality
in a way that was worthy of God, I think it would transform our
hospitality. I actually like to think of myself
as ministering to Jesus when we have guests over to our house,
because Jesus is indwelling them. And that's exactly what he says
in Matthew 25. Jesus said, in as much as you
did it to one of the least of these, my brethren, you did it
to me. And what was it that he was talking
about? What they did to the brethren, what they did to him, fed the
hungry, gave drinks to the thirsty, took a stranger in, clothed the
naked, visited the sick, visited those in prison. I mean, those
are all different kinds of hospitality. The point is that both Jesus
and John tell us to do it as if we're doing it to God. in
a manner worthy of God. That is a high, high standard
for hospitality. We represent God to the world,
and God is a God of hospitality and generosity. Interestingly,
John begins his gospel by saying that Jesus came into the world
as a stranger, and the world did not receive him, but he overcame
the world and received them. So we're really imitating Jesus.
Okay, the last example of self-sacrificing character of the hospitality
that we see in this chapter is that He calls it work, good old-fashioned
work, right? Laziness is one of the things
that keeps people from being hospitable. It takes the Protestant
work ethic to be good at hospitality. It takes a willingness to be
tired. Verse eight says, we therefore ought to receive such that we
may become fellow workers for the truth. Now, there's a boatload
of other things in that phrase we cannot get into. I wanna focus
just on that phrase, fellow workers. Obviously, the word workers implies
we got labor, we got work to do, but I love that first word
that we are fellow workers. Fellow workers, that adds to
the glorious nature of this work that receives an eternal reward. By extending hospitality to these
brothers that John had sent, Gaius shared in their labors. Fellow workers, he shared in
their labors. Matthew 10, 41 through 42 says
something very similar. He who receives a prophet in
the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward. And he who
receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall
receive a righteous man's reward. And whoever gives one of these
little ones only a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple,
assuredly I say to you, he shall by no means lose his reward. You know, one of the things that
gets me excited about extending hospitality to missionaries and
sending money to missionaries is it gives me an opportunity
to share in their labors and share in their rewards. I cannot traipse all over the
African mountains like Peter Hammond can. It just wears me
out thinking about it. And he's getting older too. When
I share in His ministry, I'm sharing in His labors, I'm sharing
in His reward, and it makes me feel excited. I remember when
I first came to the realization of how significant this was. It was much, much later in my
pastoral ministry I was going on one of my first trips to China,
and there was a poor man who wanted to contribute to my airfare
to get there. And I needed the money, but I
told him, no, there is no way you're going to be contributing
to this. And the look of disappointment on his face He said, you can't. I mean, he had tears in his eyes.
He said, don't rob me of the privilege of sharing in your
ministry and sharing in your rewards. And I was just dumbfounded. I'd never thought of it that
way before. Here was a poor man that tried
to share in as many people's ministries as he could because
it was his only way that he could share and serve the Lord and
share in their rewards. And I became an instant convert. From that moment on, I got a
vision of this being co-laborers with other people. sharing in
their rewards. It's a whole new perspective
on giving. It changed the way I give. I love to give. Now,
when I was younger, we always, even as a kid, I loved to do
hospitality. But I did have this edge in me
that was a little bit stingy. Now, I never thought of it as
being stingy. I thought of it as being frugal. But I really
was stingy when I look back on myself in those days. And now
I see all kinds of ways to give to the Lord, and it gives me
great, great pleasure. You know, one of the things that
has really transformed my life, and I'm very grateful to a brother
a couple of decades ago who convinced me of the three tithes from the
Old Testament, which amounts basically to giving two and a
third, 23 and a third percent. Yeah, get
my math right here. The three and a third percent
is because one of the 10th percenters is only given once every three
years. So you're saving up three and a third percent over a period
of three years. So you can give a big sum to
some poor person. But anyway. That thing, that
three tithe principle, just grabbed my heart and I just have fallen
in love with giving. And people sometimes have a hard
time understanding why we love to do hospitality. We've actually
had people accuse us when we were at the Davenport house and
doing day in and day out hospitality to hundreds of people, says,
you got a martyr complex, Phil. You got to cut this out. And
it's not like we didn't share. We let people invite us to their
homes. And we, hey, if you want to invite the whole church over,
yeah, feel free to do it. But we didn't have a martyr complex.
We love to do this. I really feel that God captured
my heart so much on this that we have what Paul spoke of, of
Stephanas, and the King James translates it, they were addicted
to ministry. We feel addicted to hospitality,
okay? So that's all it is. We love
it. We love it. It's a way that we have of serving
the Lord. Now, when you extend hospitality
to each other, you share in other people's labors, you receive
of their rewards, even the giving of a cup of cold water in his
name will by no means lose its reward. So just think of it this
way. Doing dishes, you're doing it for Christ. Cooking a cake,
you're doing it for Christ. Ministering to the sick, stacking
chairs after the worship service, you're doing it for Christ. You're
not just doing it for Christ, but he says, oh, there's more
to it than that. You're sharing in the labors of other people
in the church and elsewhere, and you're going to share in
their rewards. You women who serve your families
so selflessly can find a new joy when you start serving your
children and your husbands in a way that is worthy of Christ,
worthy of the Lord. Now even though that doesn't
count as hospitality, right? But it's still related and he
ministers and gives us gifts in that regard as well. And it
has a reward as well. But let me tell you this, this
work that is often extended day after day, sometimes without
thanks, is something that God smiles with approval upon. You
can be sure he does not forget. We are fellow workers for the
truth. There is a purpose, there is
a goal in what we do, and if this sermon can achieve my goal
in stirring up every man, woman, and child in this congregation
to say, I want to have that kind of a heart, I want to be engaged
in hospitality, I will be thrilled. Now, I've already mentioned that
Diotrephes was the exact opposite. He did not have this self-sacrificing
character. He was a very negative example.
I sometimes use every verse in this book to train interns, just
like I did with 2 John, in how to apply this, but also looking
at the difference between abusive leadership and approachable leadership. But let me just apply one facet
of verses 9 through 10. I wrote to the church, but Diotrephes,
who loves to have the preeminence among them, does not receive
us. Therefore, if I come, I will call to mind his deeds which
he does, prating against us with malicious words and not content
with that. He himself does not receive the
brethren and forbids those who wish to, putting them out of
the church." So John treats the root of the problem as self-serving
pride in verse 9. Pride led to malicious slander,
a refusal to even associate with those whom John had sent, and
finally, trying to fit everybody into the same pattern. Sin loves to have company, right? People
who are in sin don't want to be alone in their sin. It's amazing
what one person can do to have a negative influence on others.
Scripture makes clear that bad company corrupts good morals,
1 Corinthians 15, verse 3. We do influence each other for
either good or bad by our examples and how much more so when the
person is a leader of influence. People will excuse themselves
from hospitality on the ground that the pastor is not engaging
in it any better than they are. And I praise God that the deacons
and elders in our church love hospitality. They have an open
heart ready to minister. But we've seen thus far that
faithful hospitality flows from an open and ready heart more
than it does from having opportunity or resources. When your heart's
gripped, you're going to look for opportunities. You're going
to look for them. Second, it is characterized by self-sacrifice.
In other words, the giving of your life for the building up
of others. And lastly, it is discerning.
It is not naive. It is discerning, first of all,
in what it is patterned after. John was worried about the long-term
effects that deatrophies might have upon Gaius, and he warns
Gaius to be careful about whom he imitates. Verse 11, Beloved,
do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does
good is of God, but he who does evil has not seen God. Now, it's
natural for us to imitate our leaders. It's natural for us
to imitate those that we look up to. But what do you do when
leaders are not hospitable? Well, you'd just be hospitable
anyway. You take the leadership. You can serve in more powerful
ways than they might, but don't let the lack of hospitality that
you see in other churches stop you from leading. And again,
I am so thankful that the elders and the deacons love hospitality.
If you see our discussions, you know that we are trying to cultivate
a culture of hospitality within this church. And sometimes it
starts by inviting people over to your house over and over and
over and over again without getting a reverse invite, and that's
okay. Eventually, it catches on. And
so it's discerning, first of all, in what it is patterned
after. Second, it was discerning in how it was ministered. In
verse 12, John says, Demetrius has a good testimony from all
and from the truth itself, and we also bear witness, and you
know that our testimony is true. So it appears that Gaius, for
some reason, and we're not told why, he wondered about the advisability
of welcoming Demetrius. Maybe he had heard about Deiotrophes
and been poisoned toward him. Maybe other people were beginning
to gossip about Demetrius. We don't know, but whatever the
source of hesitation, John sets his mind at ease by bringing
forward three character witnesses in defense of Demetrius. So John
vouches for his character. He says, hey, everybody who knows
Demetrius can vouch for his character. And thirdly, just look at his
lifestyle. His own lifestyle is going to vouch for his character.
Now, just the need to bring up these good character witnesses
reminds us of John's warnings and admonition in 2 John that
we must not extend hospitality to those who are under church
discipline or those who are heretics. Or Paul actually says, If a man
work not, neither shall he eat. There are leeches out there,
you know, that you're not supposed to encourage and enable. But
on the other hand, we should not be too quick to judge who
should be rejected, especially by following one man's opinion.
Now, in conclusion, I would urge all of us to seek to improve
our serve when it comes to hospitality. Make this a goal in 2021. Obviously, you can read books
on the subject, but honestly, there's no better way of learning
than just doing it and saying, wow, I think we could improve
on this next time. You do it again, and you just
keep improving over time. We may not all be able to extend
it in the same way, But everyone, I mean, you can invite people
out to a picnic lunch, or you can do like Trevor and Tracy,
you know, the Tyler family, they're camping, and they invite people
around the bonfire, you know, roasting weenies, and maybe don't
roast weenies, marshmallows. That's fellowship. That's drawing
people into your circle. Just be creative. There's so
many different ways that we can extend hospitality. If you don't
have a home, you can certainly make people feel welcome. You
notice, oh, there's somebody standing alone that's a visitor.
Let me go out and be welcoming to that person. You do not have
to put on a big spread. In fact, some of the fondest
memories I have of hospitality were occasions where I was served
at the hands of poverty-stricken Ethiopians and poverty-stricken
Chinese farmers and the lowest classes, the Indian Dalits. Jonathan
went on a couple of trips. Jonathan and I sometimes wondered
what in the world the lumps were that we were eating. trying to
gag down, but we received them with gratefulness, even if we
didn't like the flavor. We received them with gratefulness
because we saw those as tokens of sacrificial love. It was the
best they had. I have incredibly fond memories
of those times. There are several other beautiful
applications could be made from this book, but I hope I've dug
deep enough under this central theme that every one of us will
be encouraged to imitate Gaius and be given to hospitality.
May it be so, Lord Jesus. Amen. Father, I thank you that
you have raised up so many examples of hospitality in the Bible and
elsewhere, and I pray that you would give to us an increasing
love for this discipline that reflects your heart and your
love. Father, help us to get better and better at it over
our lifetime. And bless this people, Father,
with your grace. May they find great joy in serving
you in various capacities. And I pray all of this in the
strong name of Jesus. Amen.
3 John
Series Bible Survey
| Sermon ID | 31821120374526 |
| Duration | 43:41 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | 3 John |
| Language | English |
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