Love's Habitat

A meditation for July 2004

One of the most ancient signs of a people of faith was its willingness to show hospitality. Abraham and Sarah entertained angels unaware. Again and again it was a messenger of God who came as a stranger and who, when offered a welcome, bestowed the grace of God.

Many of Jesus’ parables of the Kingdom of God included references to landowners or householders. The father of the prodigal welcomes home the wayward son and invites the stay-at-home elder brother to join in a celebration of the lost being found. Jesus described himself as one who was homeless.

The word “habitat” brings to mind the ministry of Habitat For Humanity, which circles the globe, seeking to give people a hand up, not a hand out. Millions of people around the world suffer for lack of adequate shelter. All our efforts to put a roof over their heads fall short, however, if the helping hand is not offered in love.

For hospitality must reach beyond meeting the physical needs of the least of these, our brothers and sisters. There are spiritual needs which are met only as love comes to dwell among us.

We are each called to be a living example of the welcoming love of God !

Love’s Habitat

Come in and sit a spell and I will tell you about One who did not have a place to lay his head.

Though I speak with a down-home dialect or choose to use high flown phrases, but I welcome you without demonstrating love for you, it will be just double talk and sounds echoing in an empty space.

And if I have the power to anticipate your needs and to know what you want from me; and even if I have faith to move mountains of objections in order to offer you a home and resting place, but do it without your finding true neighborly love, I fail you.

If I sacrifice my own comfort and deliver on every promised perk, but share without love, I gain nothing and give nothing of lasting value.

Love that welcomes a stranger is patient with differences and kind in its judgments. It is not jealous of another’s gifts and does not play games of one-up; it is not arrogant in its giving nor condescending in its conduct.

Love that offers shelter is not insistent on its own life style, is not irritated easily nor resentful of being needed; it does not rejoice in stumbling starts but rejoices in each successful step taken.

Love that recognizes a neighbor shares the burden of past failures, believes in promises made, hopes for a home coming, endures as long as it takes.

Love never gives up. As for projections of failure or success, they will prove futile. As for stated expectations, they will cease to be cited. As for becoming deserving, it will slip between our fingers.

For certainty eludes us, even our own, and our dreams die; but when self-giving love for a neighbor claims us, our imperfect mercy will be overwhelmed.

When I began my faith journey, I thought I knew how to show hospitality. I spoke in theory of human rights. I thought of all families as having a roof over their heads. I reasoned that people being homeless was not my problem.

When I grew up into my place in a world where each child of God deserves a home, I gave up my immature assumptions.

For now we see our own limited vision reflected in society’s values, but we yearn for a new vision of a human family sheltered and at home.

Now I know only partially what it means that God has come to dwell in our midst, but I am coming to know more fully as I join to make a habitat for humanity.

So we dwell in the house of the Lord forever, with faith in the One who has prepared a place for us; with hope in an eternal homecoming, and above all with love for those who have not a place to lay their head. These three abide, but the greatest of these is the welcoming love of God.

Make your home with love.

(Permission is given to reproduce, with source acknowledged.)
From Love’s Letters: A Poetic Book of Confessions by George Gunn
(Library Lane Press / Copyright 2001)