Hospitable Hearts: The Bounce Back of Welcoming Others

How do we teach our children the skill of valuing others? By having hospitable hearts! Plus, there’s a bounce-back for our kids.

Folks will focus on us for Mother’s Day. But what’s all the fuss about really? Here’s one thing all good moms do well. They welcome others with hospitable hearts. Clearly, hospitality is so much more than hosting parties.

As mothers, we all know welcoming others into our lives always bounces back to bless our children. Our kids become more confident when they see the value God puts on all people.

For instance, take this poignant example of how important a warm welcome is.

“I had crossed the line. I was free; but there was no one to welcome me to the land of freedom. I was a stranger in a strange land.“~Harriet Tubman

Imagine achieving freedom after traveling hundreds of miles in hiding, days and nights spent in life-threatening danger. Yet, in the moment of her tremendous victory, Harriet Tubman felt the absence of welcome. 

“To have freedom but be missing a welcome, it (welcome) is THAT important,” agrees Anna.

Hospitable Hearts

For Anna Krafve Pierce, our daughter and one of my favorite cohosts, a hospitable heart means going “deeper to the idea of expanding my heart to include new people, even those people who may seem unlovable to other people.” She added the perfect example of a heart full of love for whoever God brings across our path that day.

“When you say hospitality, I immediately visualize my daughter sitting on the front porch. With her cookie. In her little red dress. Waiting on the first guest,” says Anna. It was her daughter’s first tea party as co-hostess with the grown-up ladies and she was giddy with excitement!

With effervescent enthusiasm, my little granddaughter dashed across the yard to greet the first guests even before their car doors opened. Smiling, she welcomed them in by the hand to enjoy the tea, the cookies, the fellowship. 

“I was thinking about what is the first ingredient of hospitality,” says Anna. “I think it might be anticipation.”

Released From Negative Self Talk

Maybe, like me, you struggle with feeling unworthy–how do we reach out to others when we feel yucky? How do I encourage myself, even in those self-loathing, self-rejecting moments? 

I hear this over and over as I talk to amazing successful women who’ve conquered tons of stuff. We all know women commonly feel discouraged and anxious. So how do I offer my own heart the same kind of welcome I want to give others? Anna thinks we can build confidence in our kids long before negative self-talk ever takes root. (For more on raising confident girls, click here.)

Anna offered some wonderful examples of how we include others in our lives, to set the stage for our kids’ success and confidence. Not to mention our own emotional and mental health!

She suggested a hospitable heart overflows with the same kind of love God expresses for each one of us. His love initiates in celebratory anticipation. She compares it to Christmas morning.

A Christmas Morning Kind of Love

“When a little kid knows they’re gonna get the bike. Wouldn’t it be awesome if everywhere you went, you knew the person who was there was already anticipating you in that way?” she explains, “It makes heaven look really wonderful because we know God is anticipating us in that way.”

I have a friend who habitually greets people like they are her long-lost friend, even if you just saw her yesterday. She always wraps her arms around us with enthusiastic love and welcome. She became my perfect example of how I wanted to greet others.

When I mentioned this friend anonymously on-air, Anna knew exactly who I meant. (For more on building great friendships, click here.)

“I almost always have a ‘contract’ with her when I have a party, ‘Yes, you’re coming because it won’t be a party unless you’re there,’” laughs Anna. “She is so dear.” Her way of welcome has now influenced our family into three generations.

Heaven’s Welcome

When you tell me Jesus is looking forward to my arrival in heaven with that kind of anticipation I immediately think of her. She is what would Jesus do when it comes to hospitable hearts and welcome. (For more on how God loves us and seeks us out, click here.)

“And just think of it. We now anticipate her and her welcome.” She’s the perfect example of how welcoming others into her heart has bounced back to make us all watch for and welcome her. 

I’ve written tons more about hospitable hearts in my book, The Gentle Art of Companionship,: Communicating Your Way to a Delightful Marriage, due out in Fall 2020. I hope you’ll join me in praying for that project to reach many people with God’s blessing.

The Bounce-Back of a Hospitable Heart

The bounce-back of hospitable hearts happens in three ways. What a perfect gift to give your kids for Mother’s Day!

• By welcoming others, you teach your children that ALL people deserve respect and welcome. That means confidence permeates their hearts at an early age about the respect and appreciation they deserve from others. 
• Welcoming others prepares your kids to notice when people do not appreciate them. This means our children bounce back quicker when others are unkind, as inevitably happens. They know the unwelcome problem is about the other person’s wounded heart, not theirs.  
• As people trust your kids to consistently welcome them, others will look forward to seeing them, too. Like our family friend, their influence and kindness can impact other families for generations to come.

What if no one shows up?

Speaking of hospitality, especially this year, Mother’s Day may be quiet. Which begs the question: What if you plan wonderful party and only a small number of people show up?

“My kids know success is not the number of people who show up,” says Anna, “success is being ready in case people show up. Success is putting ourselves out there and offering people friendship. And, success is enjoying the people who do show up, even if it’s just one person.” 

But, seriously, what if absolutely no one at all shows up?

“Success is having a home that’s already clean for my family to enjoy without guests,” she laughs. (For Anna’s thoughts on how tea parties inspire confidence in our daughters, click here.)

The Vulnerable Heart

“I have dealt with a lot of people who I thought were meant to be my friends, but they did not feel the same way,” she shares. “I’ve made myself vulnerable, put myself out there many times over the years. Then discovered that was not going to be returned.” Even when folks don’t respond as we like, Anna chooses a hospitable heart.

“I’ve thought it through a lot. What is my calling and what is success here?” Her definition of success came as a result of recognizing a calling to communicate other people’s value any and every time she can.

She believes we communicate value to others when we invite them into our homes, our hearts, or our lives, no matter what response we get. (You can hear more of her thoughts about God’s calling to communicate other people’s value in the above podcast or find it on FiresideTalk Radio.)

Called By Name

Our dear family friend welcomes us with dramatic flair and the whole room knows she love you when she says your name. But we have another family friend whose welcome is very different, but every bit as effective. 

“He makes me feel so welcome,” says Anna. “He is very calm and dignified, very poised, but he knows your name, just like she does.” Anna noticed the parallel and applied it to her parenting.

“So, that’s what I’’m teaching my kids. On a practical level, I am teaching them to make the effort to know people’s names.”

Instead of teaching them the traditional Texas response for adults—yes, ma’am or yes, sir—Anna is teaching her children to use the name of the person. Her kids say, “Yes, Super Gram.”

“We’re using names because it’s powerful. I want them to have that power of communicating that the person in front of them is valuable.”

It’s common for many of us to struggle to remember names and faces—ahem, namely me. Perhaps that’s why there’s so much love communicated when folks remember my name or face.

“You have to practice. It’s like anything else in life if you don’t practice you won’t remember it,” coaches Anna, “Particularly with someone who is a new person in your world.” (For ways we can help each other in our churches, click here.)

Coming back to our friend who is an expert at calling folks by their names, Anna adds this closing thought about keeping a hospitable heart to always welcome others.

“I feel so honored when he greets me by name. It is an honor every single time. The feeling of being honored by him knowing me has never worn thin.”

I hope you, dear one, know you are loved and welcomed by me. Even though it used to be hard for me to open my heart due to my own insecurity, it no longer is. I truly welcome you into my life. Blessings for a Happy Mother’s Day! May you know you are truly loved!

Coming Soon

Next week we start a two-part series designed to give us all a tool to bring up the hard topic of domestic violence, even among Christians. The wonderful Paula Silva will be our guest. (For tools to start conversations around other hard topics, click here.)

I hope you’ll tune in for this crucial broadcast. And please pray, since those podcasts seem to invite a bunch of attack by an enemy who’d like to discourage us and thwart the Holy Spirit’s leading! 

We also have a wonderful conversation with our old friend Stan Ward coming up which is particularly fun, since Dr. Ward tends to be a down-to-earth genius-y kinda guy. You’ll be encouraged about his ideas to beat burn out and stress. Love, love, love his stuff, including his new book, How To Beat Burnout: For Yourself, Your Family, and Your Team.

Finally, I want to give a shout out to my new friend, the hilarious and serious simultaneously, Stephen Tilmon, who invited me on his podcast, Faith and Failures. I love what Stephen is doing to engage people from all perspectives in conversation. I can hardly wait for him to publish our conversation! (If you like funny, he also does a podcast with a life- long friend called The Bearded Cactus–the kind of podcasts where kids come in and sit in daddy’s lap while the men keep it real. Very hilarious stuff!)

Finally, please, please keep praying for the upcoming interview for moms who discover their daughter has been assaulted by a family member. I had to reschedule because, yes, the devil likes to keep us isolated and disconnected!! Please pray for the amazing Deb Butterfield to stay well and safe! (If, like me, you can’t wait for the interview, her book is here.)

May we pray together?

Father in heaven, Oh how we love You. You welcome us into Your presence with enthusiastic joy. You cherish our hearts. We go about our day confident in Your love. Please help us draw deeply from Your Holy Spirit’s living water so we can splash love to others. Give us hospitable hearts. Help us pass along open hearts to our own kiddos. Thank You for designing mommies and kiddos to make the world a happier place full of life and joy—between laundry, dirty dishes, and paw prints on the furniture! Thank you for a day to honor moms, good Lord. We love you. In Jesus’s name. Amen.

We LOVE to hear from YOU!

What’s your favorite way of showing hospitality? For Mother’s Day, what creative plans do you have this year? Which podcast guests would you like to hear from in the coming months?

Cathy Krafve, Columnist, Speaker, Blogger, Podcaster, and Christian Writer, invites your stories, ideas, and questions at CathyKrafve.com. Truth with a Texas Twang.