Won’t You Be My Neighbor? | Eternal Hospitality | Mark 6:21-44 | Week 4

We're at week four of a four-week series that we've entitled "Won't You Be My Neighbor?" It was inspired by Jesus who inspired Mr. Rogers who then inspired us. We've been talking about being neighborly. Not about defining who are neighbor is but about becoming neighborly. We said, a few weeks ago, that that's not always easy. As long as there's been hospitality, there's been complaining about offering it. The Scriptures are real honest and say: Offer hospitality without grumbling. Evidently that was a thing 2000 years ago too. Last week we said that the ordinary table might be the best evangelistic invention ever created; that something sacred happens when people gather around a table. These four weeks are really one message put together, so today is the conclusion those messages --- Won't you be my neighbor?
I grew up in southern California, so like Colorado, most of the days were sunny, although there seemed to be a cloud that hovered over one house on the street that I lived on. It was the house of Mr. Marshall. Before there was Clint Eastwood telling people to get off his lawn, there was Mr. Marshall making it clear he didn't want you anywhere near his house. It was covered with overgrown juniper bushes and the lawn was unkempt. Even if it was sunny and 85, which it was most days, his house seemed to be covered in a cloud of gloom. We avoided it---this was how bad it was---even on Halloween! He might as well had a sign, outside of his house, that said "Keep Out." If a ball went into his yard---which it did often---it stayed there. Keep out...