Hospitality: Spiritual Gifts Definitions, Scriptures, and Ways to Serve
[If you have not already done so, please take a moment now to take this free spiritual gifts assessment. Once you have your results, come back to this and the corresponding 22 blog posts for a detailed description of each of the gifts, focusing on your own as well as becoming familiar with all of them so you can spot and call them out in others.]
Hospitality
Hospitality is the divine ability to make people feel welcome and accepted--anywhere at any time. Those with this gift enjoy connecting people with each other and creating settings where relationships and community can flourish. Their graciousness and warmth make others feel cared for. And, as 1 Peter 4:9 says, they are the ones who do all this “without grumbling” or complaining.
Scriptures that reference Hospitality or show someone exhibiting this gift:
Acts 16 (Lydia); Romans 16 (Gaius); Hebrews 13; 1 Peter 4.
Questions on the assessment that pertain to Hospitality:
In gatherings of people, I tend to notice those at the margins and make them feel like they belong.
Either in my home or elsewhere, I create a welcoming environment for people to gather.
Others have noticed that I am good at making people feel welcome and accepted wherever I go.
Some words that describe people with this gift:
Accepting
Welcoming
Relational
Safe
Cheerful
Warm
Potential negatives to this gift:
If undertaking too many commitments that involve hospitality, might burn out.
Might not view this as a spiritual gift or as equally important to the Body of Christ as other gifts.
Might wonder why all believers aren’t more hospitable or as hospitable as the gifted one is.
Some possible ways to serve using this gift:
Greeter/welcome team/new member hospitality team/visitor calling team
Coffee-time host
Information booth helper/coordinator
Small Group leader/facilitator/helper
Friend to an international visitor/student
Host family for a church intern or missionary
Mentor
Host home for youth ministry
Stephen Ministry
Shirley Giles Davis, author of the God. Gifts. You. Your Unique Calling and Design workbook, Your Unique Design Class Guide, Your Unique Design Facilitator Guide, and Gifts-Calling-Purpose blog, is a consultant, coach, facilitator who has worked with hundreds of faith-based organizations, nonprofit agencies, and executive leaders in a diversity of fields for four decades. She currently serves as Catalyst for Equipping and overseer of Local Missions at her church.
Photo © Shirley Giles Davis.
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