Presented by Julie Busteed

What is the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word hospitality? Do you picture having friends over for dinner or hosting overnight guests? We are looking at what it means to show hospitality from a biblical perspective.

When I have guests over it usually involves a lot of planning and preparation ahead of time. I’m thinking about menus, making lists, going grocery shopping, planning activities, cleaning the house—all to make guests feel comfortable and welcome. And I enjoy doing it. But is that really what the Apostle Paul is talking about in Romans 12?

Share with the Lord’s people who are in need. Practice hospitality (Romans 12:13).

What does it mean to practice hospitality? It’s an unusual phrase to me; it stands out to me. The definition of practice means to put something into action—not just think about it. Hospitality comes from the Latin word “hospes” meaning host, visitor, or stranger. It focuses on the treatment of strangers and visitors, not just friends.

This is not the first thing that comes to mind when I think of hospitality. But I think it’s what Paul means: actively seek to welcome and care for those you don’t already know. The ESV translation puts it this way, seek to show hospitality. It’s not just about entertaining—it’s about looking for people in need and reaching out.

I also like the way The Message paraphrases it: be inventive in hospitality. Be creative about showing God’s love to others who are in need. There’s not just one way to practice hospitality. Use the gifts God has given you to practice hospitality.

Biblical hospitality goes beyond dinner parties. It’s about seeing and serving others—especially those who might feel overlooked or alone. Maybe it’s inviting someone who needs encouragement or having a homesick student over for a meal.

The Bible doesn’t say this is a requirement for only certain people with specific gifts—not just for those of us who like to entertain guests. I think all of us are called to “practice” hospitality. It’s not dependent on our own feelings, living conditions, talents, or resources. It’s about putting God’s love into action in practical and meaningful ways.

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

Love. This rich, often misused word in our culture is all over the Bible. We seem to hold it loosely in today’s culture. Using the word love to say we love a particular food, the way something looks, or how we feel about things, people, and activities. How many times have you proclaimed, “I love this and such!”

These cultural exhortations don’t meet the biblical standard of love we are commanded to show as followers of Jesus Christ.

As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to the greatest commandment in Matthew 22:37-39. We are told, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind…and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

1 John 4:19 gives us the added standard of we love because he (God) first loved us.

How did Jesus love us? Sacrificially, unconditionally, and wholly. He loved us so much he died for our sins.

God’s love is not loose. God’s love is described as steadfast and enduring, sacrificial, unconditional, personal, and transformative. This is a hesed love. Often translated as lovingkindness, mercy, and steadfast love. It encompasses how much God loves us, and how he shows love for us.

As we focus on how to show God’s love to others and remember that God’s love is constant, we also need to be honest with ourselves. There are worldly blocks that keep us from showing God’s love to others. As the world creeps in, the love we are called to show gets dimmed.

One of the fruits of the spirit I often need to work on is patience or long-suffering. Of course, the opposite of patience is impatience. One of the ways we can show people God’s love is through how we display patience. When we are the opposite—impatient—we can scarcely show love.

How patient was God with you in your sin? In your wandering? Before you accepted Jesus? What about after? Clearly, we are having a conversation about being impatient believers. Guess what, God is still patient with us, bearing with us in our sin.

Impatience can show itself in how we deal with others and how we deal with situations. Sometimes at the same time!

Romans 12:12 tells us to rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer.

It is natural to impatiently await the end of a hard trial in our lives. Whether it is a health hardship, financial hardship, or something else, what matters is how we show others how we are dealing with whatever it is. Part of showing God’s love in tribulation is modeling how our understanding and belief in his faithfulness. It can open conversations with others about why we are different and give us a wonderful opportunity to talk about God’s love for us!

We may also be impatiently waiting to hear about something good! Perhaps it is a promotion or a new job. Again, are you impatiently displaying your waiting, or are you telling others how you trust God’s timing for you. Being filled with impatience whether in the waiting or a trial doesn’t leave us much room to think about how we can love others.

Ephesians 4:2 tells us we should act with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love.

But what about when you don’t feel very patient and loving? Is there a person at work who is on your last nerve? Whether it is a colleague, boss or subordinate, how can you be patient with them even when you really don’t want to?

Romans 12:12 offers some of the best advice—be constant in prayer. When I am feeling impatient, this is my go-to. I pray to God to give me the patience he has shown to me. And I ask others to pray very specifically for my patience!

I find a close follower of impatience to be judgement. Whether it is judging ourselves harshly or judging someone else, we clearly block both experiencing God’s love ourselves or showing it to others.

2 Corinthians 5:10 reminds us that we all must appear before the judgement seat of Christ, so that each of us may receive what is due us for the ...

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

Has someone ever asked you if you live to work or work to live? Did you know this question is one asked on some assessments to evaluate whether a candidate is a fit for a company culture? I will admit, I was a live to work woman for a long time. Over the years I have shifted more to a work to live mentality, but I know God calls us to strike a balance. After all, he created us for work!

Living to work means you get up each day with work as your number 1! Working to live feels more like, I cannot wait for my day to end so I can be doing life. If you were hiring someone, how would you want them to answer this question? While I think we likely have seen a shift in how many would answer this question, I wonder how this sits for a prospective employer. If you are a manager or business owner, you want to hire people who are motivated to come to work and do a good job! But I would argue you also want employees who have a good balance of loving their life!

As employees, God calls us to do good work as we are his representatives every day, but we need to be mindful we don’t get too focused on the live to work mentality! It can be so tempting to pour time into our work, especially if we enjoy our colleagues and our work. The more we live to work, the easier it is for that busyness to be all consuming!

Jesus cautions us of the live to work mentality. We see this contrast between Mary and Martha in Luke 10:38-42. Martha is busy and distracted with serving and Mary is sitting at Jesus feet listening to his teaching.

Jesus tells Martha she is anxious and troubled about many things but one thing is necessary.

One thing is necessary, and that is coming to the feet of Jesus. If you and I are anxious and distracted by living to work, we will clearly miss opportunities to both experience God’s love and show God’s love to others.

Striking a balance, making God first and loving others a close second, is where we need to rest.

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

Have you set some goals lately: personal or professional? How are they impacting how you show God’s love? Goals are important: personally and professionally. In the context of work, goals help us understand our part in a larger vision or project that impact our organization. Outside of work, goals can help us focus on achieving in other aspects of our life like health or finance.

I would argue any good goal can go bad, especially when it takes us away from what is most important to God. Again, Scripture tells us God wants us to love him and love others as we love ourselves.

How full is your goal set both at work and personally? Is this filling your time so much that you are not able to love God or love others? We live in a metric-based, title-hungry culture. When we set goals, how are we being measured, and what is the reward?

When the measurement and reward become more important than God, we start walking down that slippery slope.

Are you in sales? Perhaps you take an extra lead or two that will help win a trip or sweeten a bonus, but this causes a colleague to miss their goal by a margin. Or maybe you end up staying late to get more done and skip a church commitment.

Are you working a lot of overtime to make your metrics look better than others at work and miss time connecting with a friend in prayer?

Perhaps you feel like you are pulling a lot of weight on a project and complain about a colleague, not knowing they are suffering a personal hardship.

Personally, have you set goals that compromise your time spent in God’s Word, or are you doing activities you enjoy but keep you away from showing love to your family?

Measurement and reward: They are not bad but can become bad when they are not balanced with our thoughts about God and our love for others.

We are already winning in the eyes of God if we have accepted Jesus as our Lord and Savior. How can we show this to others? Maybe you pass those sales leads along, help balance the workload to make your team look better or ask questions when a colleague is falling behind on a project. We are called to walk differently. Our reward is much greater than any trip or title we could ever achieve here on earth!

How can we show others this type of love? Not the pizza and coffee love. Not the “I love my dog” love. Not the “I love the way the color looks on you” love. I mean the “I want to share life with you” love—the proverbial “I would give to someone event if it hurt” love. The love that weeps with those who weep and rejoices when others rejoice.

When we are too busy, it is easy to give the glossy heart and flowers love. It is harder to focus on and think about how God wants us to show his love to others.

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

A culture of busyness can keep us from showing God’s love. How loosely do we hold this word? Like our notions about time, we also confuse love. A large part of our problem is we love everything and everyone. So, when you pause to think about how to show God’s love to others or to explain to them what God’s love feels like, maybe it gets lost in the emptiness we often attribute to this word.

We all love. When thinking about using the word love, my mind is filled with red and pink hearts, flowers, candies, and other visual or physical ways we see or experience love. I also think about how many times I have used the word love in the prior weeks. I love having coffee with my friends. I love the flowers I buy from a local farmstand. I love my husband. I love my dogs. I proclaim how much I love a friend’s dress. I love pizza. I loved our zoom gathering this month. I think you see my point.

We fly loosely with the word love, and if we are too busy to reflect on how special God’s love for us is, it will be very hard to show it to others. While everything I noted already can help us show God’s love to others, we need to go deeper into the meaning of what God wants us to show others.

God’s love is described as steadfast and enduring, sacrificial, unconditional, personal, and transformative. Perhaps you have heard the word Hesed. This is the deep conventual love in action that God gives to us as a promise.

There is nothing we can do to change God’s love for us. It never fades. We feel God’s sacrificial love in John 3:16.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life (John 3:16).

We see his steadfast and enduring love for those that, even though they wander like Israel, God still loves them.

We see his transformational love in Jesus’ abundant healing ministry.

How can we show others this type of love? Not the pizza and coffee love. Not the “I love my dog” love. Not the “I love the way the color looks on you” love. I mean the “I want to share life with you” love—the proverbial “I would give to someone event if it hurt” love. The love that weeps with those who weep and rejoices when others rejoice.

When we are too busy, it is easy to give the glossy heart and flowers love. It is harder to focus on and think about how God wants us to show his love to others.

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

How are you filling your calendar each day? These days, it is harder to be disconnected and unseen. Even through the lens of work, digital connection and the importance of social media can fill our moments more than we realize. Most companies have an entire marketing and social media strategy, but now we live in a time where personal branding and social media strategies are noted as important for our careers.

Gone are the simple days of a resume, and if you are in a job search, it can feel overwhelming. The traditional outplacement or career coach has taken on a new role that focuses on image, connection, and perhaps even developing a website. While the first use of the term personal brand dates back to 1997 in an article in Fast Company Magazine, the notion of personal brands as a strategic career asset is relatively recent. While created in 2003, LinkedIn has exploded in the recent years alongside other platforms.

You may be thinking, Lauren, what does this have to do with how I show God’s love?! My answer—simply, if we don’t pay enough attention to the need for our own attention, it is easy to keep the focus on ourselves and not on others. Now, I am not suggesting a personal brand is bad, but I do want us to think about the time it takes. What are you doing in your spare moments to create your personal brand? If you are in a job search this may be a greater amount of time, but if you are working full-time, this easily creeps into spare moments and evenings. How much time are you spending focused on yourself? And if you are focused on your personal brand, how can you first spend that all important time with God? And how can you show God’s love if you are constantly consumed with the social and digital aspects of this personal brand culture?

Have you ever paused to consider what the Lord wants for our self-promotion? How would God want us to get noticed? How is God part of your personal brand?

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you (Matthew 6:5-6).

First, as we balance showing our faith at work, we need to consider our intentions always. Are our intentions genuine, or are we trying to be seen? Second, invite God into this practice through prayer. How can he guide how you present yourself? Finally, pause and make sure you are looking at the needs of your neighbors. Don’t spend so much time consumed with your digital brand that you forget the importance of connecting with others. Maybe they are struggling with some of the same things. How can you invite God and others into this new era of extra busyness that can easily cause too much self-focus?

Presented by Lauren Stibgen

We live measuring time: minutes, hours, days. We count just about everything that we do in time. We use time to mark special occasions, like birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays. Some of us make lists of what we are doing with our time, and almost everyone has a digital calendar with the advent of the smartphone. We talk about how we fill our time, as if there is a vessel to be filled. The problem is we keep filling the vessel until it simply overflows and cannot hold anything else!

We talk a lot about how we fill our time. In fact, it is common to ask, what does your schedule look like this week? Do you have time for ___? Can you squeeze in ___?

Think about your calendar for a moment. I want you to visualize this for me. Each day has 24 hours that can be scheduled whether you use a paper or a digital calendar. Most mark the time in 30-minute increments. How much of your calendar is full or colored in? Family, work, social commitments, but what about God commitments? You have heard this before: if the devil can’t make you bad, he’ll make you busy. Attributed to Corrie ten Boom, this phrase sums up why I want to highlight our culture of busyness and how this inhibits us from showing God’s love.

You and I are running quickly and filling our calendars with everything but God. And, if we are not filling our time seeking God’s presence, other things that can be bad more readily can creep in. How can we expect to experience God’s love or show others God’s love if we make no time for this?

We will consider some of the ways our work culture creates more busyness—inhibiting us from showing God’s love if we don’t consciously make time to fill our moments, thinking about this most important command, to love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul and with all your mind (Matthew 22:37) and to love your neighbor as yourself (Matthew 22:39).

I’m sure there have been people in your life you thought, “I’d like to be like her—or like him.” You saw things in that person which were attractive and endearing, and you desired those qualities for yourself. Well, I want to encourage you to have that attitude toward a man named Joseph. His name was Joseph, but the apostles called him Barnabas, which means Son of Encouragement. You can read about him in Acts 4.

Imagine people calling you by a name that signified you were an encouraging person. I can’t think of a greater compliment, can you? I want to show you how you can become a Barnabas in your workplace; you can be known as a person who encourages others. A good friend, Traci Mason, has compiled these ideas and allowed me to share them with you.

We all recognize our workplaces can be full of discouragement, especially in these days of economic uncertainty. But this gives us a perfect opportunity to help others by becoming an encouraging person. Now, mind you, this will take some time and effort on your part, but the return on your investment will be eternal!

So, here are some practical ways you can become a Barnabas where you work:

Write notes. Handwritten notes are almost extinct. Keep a supply of note cards and encourage colleagues by placing a note on their desk, in their mailbox, or in their hand. It’s easy to make personalized cards on our computers now; so, get creative and write a note just to encourage someone.

Send e-cards. It’s really easy to send an e-card to your coworkers to let them know you are thinking of them. You can even send the same card to multiple addresses. Employees receive messages that make requests and give instructions. They would surely welcome something more pleasant in their inbox, and an e-card would be a pleasant surprise.

Remember birthdays. Find out the birthdates of coworkers, put them on your calendar, and simply give each coworker a birthday card to help them celebrate their special day. We send birthday cards here each month, and I’ve been amazed at how many people are encouraged to receive a special birthday card. It’s so easy to do!

Smile! Did you realize a simple smile can cheer up and encourage someone? Smiles are contagious and can brighten the atmosphere where you work. When talking to or passing by others, just turn up the corners of your mouth and flash them a radiant smile. It costs you nothing, and it can really make a difference in someone’s day.

Greet people! As you enter the workplace, greet coworkers with a simple, “Good morning.” You never know the energy it took for others to arrive at work. A pleasant greeting can start a person’s day off right and possibly help them forget about their troubles.

Be the Welcome Committee. When a new employee joins the team, introduce yourself and offer to be of assistance. Help that person find his or her way around, offer to have lunch together. Think how comforting it could be for that new colleague, because being the new person can be challenging and a little frightening.

Share your lunch. Purposely take more than you can eat for lunch and invite a coworker to eat with you. Or if you baked something special and have some leftovers, bring it in for others to enjoy. You could go the extra mile and ask them ahead of time to share lunch with you the next day.

You may be thinking these don’t sound very impressive or important, but it is so often the little things we do can touch someone else. These things help them see they are not forgotten, and they are encouraged. Become an encourager on the job. It will make a difference.

Here are some more creative ways you can be a Barnabas on the job:

Offer to help your boss. That’s what I said—offer to help your boss. Instead of running from work or assignments, ask your boss what you can do today to help him or her, especially if you know your boss is under a lot of pressure. Bosses need help just like everybody else, yet often they are overlooked.

When was the last time you told someone, “I love you”? I hope it hasn’t been long since you expressed love to someone, and I hope it hasn’t been long since someone returned that expression of love to you. Love has the power to transform us, both as givers and receivers of love.

I’m not speaking necessarily of romantic love, though of course that certainly can transform us, can’t it? Rather, just love in general—knowing that we are loved and being able to love others can change you, put a smile on your face, put a lift in your step, transform the mundaneness of life into something meaningful. All because we are loved and are loving.

That’s why Paul wrote to the Corinthians that love never fails. What else in life can you say never fails? The best computer you can buy can and does fail. The best friend can fail you. The best job can fail to deliver what you need or want. God can never fail you, and God is love. Love never fails.

It never fails to transform a person who is difficult, though it may take longer than you want. I remember when a friend of mine, Beth, worked for a very difficult manager. No one liked her; she was demanding, unfriendly, sour—just a miserable person. God used a verse—Proverbs 19:6—to tell Beth how to show love to this woman. That verse says, “Many curry favor with a ruler, and everyone is the friend of one who gives gifts.” She knew God wanted her to give this woman a gift on her birthday.

She bought something small but thoughtful, wrote a note thanking her for pursuing excellence, and left it on her desk on her birthday. This simple act of love transformed that woman, and she and Beth became friends from that point on. With tears in her eyes, she said to Beth that no one had ever given her a birthday gift before. Because Beth was willing to obey God’s voice to show love to this woman, it transformed her, filling up a huge empty space inside of her and changing that relationship.

Love is powerful. It never fails. I hope you will bask in the incredibly good news that God loves you and nothing can separate you from his love. And then you will become more and more intentional about loving others. It has the power to transform you, your relationships, your attitude, your productivity—love transforms us. Believe me, it’s true.

Why is it so important for us to be loved? We were created by God with this need to love and be loved. This need is at the core of your being, and if you don’t feel you are loved, it leaves a huge empty space in your sense of worth and value.

The sad truth is if you grew up without feeling loved as you should have been, it can leave you emotionally needy, and that means you can’t love others as you should. You don’t have love to give, so to speak. This lack of love and loving then can lead to all kinds of emotional and mental problems, such as resentment, bitterness, a judgmental spirit, or depression. And then your lack of love from others begets more lack of love from you to others. It becomes a vicious cycle.

This great need for love can lead you to look for love in all the wrong places, as the song goes, and put you on an endless quest for acquiring love, and that quest actually takes you further and further away from true, unconditional love. Can you relate to this? No doubt you know people who are on or have been on that futile quest for love.

Here’s the incredibly good news: God’s love for you can fill up that emptiness inside, which then gives you the ability to love others, and then you’ll discover the love you give others comes back to you. We get love by giving it away, and we have love to give away because we know we are loved by Jesus.

If you want to fill up your inner coffers with love, find some ways today to love others. Who is in your life today? How can you give them love? Here are some suggestions:

Purpose in your heart to find something good about that person or people in your life today and express it in words to them.

Listen to someone’s story without criticizing or lecturing them—even without giving advice.

Call someone who is needy and say, “I’m here for you if you need me.”

Compliment someone on a job well done, an attractive outfit, a kindness offered.

Smile!

It doesn’t take much to share love with someone else. We just have to remember to do it. Of course, we need to pray God will help us to become lovers—people who willingly and frequently share his love with others. Remember, love begets love. Try it! You won’t be sorry you did.