Guests from Overseas

My mom slowed every sentence, enunciated each syllable for our guests from overseas. Instead of mimicking her manners, I quickened my dialogue. Especially when I wanted my mom’s undivided attention.  “Timarie, retell the story. Slower now. Let’s include Stephanie,” my mom interrupted. I rolled my eyes. A lot. At sixteen, I was learning French in high school, so the idea of hosting an exchange student sounded reasonable. Two weeks in, showing patience felt impossible. My mom insisted we open our home to guests, not just one summer, but multiple. What made her hospitality endure was her experience as one twice adopted.

Soon after her birth, my mom was adopted into a home with loving parents, financial security. It was not a perfect home. Sadly, it broke into halves after a decade or so when her adopted parents chose other interests and spouses. My mom isn’t here to talk about it with me now. She’s been in Heaven for ten years already. So, I speculate. As a storyteller, I process my faith and maturity in Christ as I write. Looking back, my mom’s hospitality reflected attributes of her second adoption.

As a young adult, my mom was welcomed by God, adopted again. It must have been a fascinating time to live in the 1970s during a revival. My parents were baptized at Newport Beach's "Pirate's Cove" in Southern California, as seen on the Jesus Revolution movie. They lived in a tiny apartment and attended a church devoted to reading the Gospels. Jesus, they discerned, was more than a prophet, more than a historical person. My parents called Jesus, “Lord,” and treasured the Bible as inspired by God.

When I came along in 1979, they briefly hosted a teenage aunt, my dad’s half-sister, who was troubled and displaced after her parents divorced. Hospitality, to my parents, symbolized the welcome we received from God. My parents believed Jesus’s life, death, and resurrection placed them—as a free gift—into fellowship with God. So, for them, opening their home extended the hospitality they experienced in Christ.

My parents would model this to my brothers and me, though I didn’t yet perceive the correlation. Hosting exchange students had drawbacks and perks. The students—guests from Japan, Australia, Spain, France—brought us gifts and taught us how to say words in their language. They diversified our worldview, convincing us to try Vegemite, escargot, or seaweed rolls. Today, sushi is one of my favorite foods, and the pieces I write display care for other cultures.

Our home in Oceanside, California was a place of welcome, although I suspect it was a strain for my mom as our family of six shared our calendar and space with strangers from across the globe. When my mom became the director of the exchange student program, she had to convince people in the community to host students, and those conversations surely wore on her. The deadline pressed for each student to have a home. Whether we were at church, the grocery store, or the baseball field, my mom persuaded her peers to consider the need for host families.

I didn’t like slowing down my sentences for Stephanie, or any exchange student. In retrospect, the perks outweighed the drawbacks, but at the time I was thinking mostly of myself. It’s inconvenient to rearrange a summer and host guests. I was often unpleasant, jealous that my mom devoted her time. Jealousy fostered complaining and contempt. It’s not natural to be hospitable. But now I grasp what influenced my mom.

To be counted once as strangers, separated from God. All of us are—till Jesus becomes more than a person to us.

God made people in his image and called his creation good. But after creation, the fall disrupted and divided, separating God and people, because God is holy. Redemption came in Jesus, restoring those who believe. In him we are adopted. We are hosted and welcomed.

Stephanie spent a month with us that summer and probably saw the gratitude and joy my mom displayed. Although I rolled my eyes at inconveniences, my mom would tirelessly drive Stephanie and me to the movies, the mall, or the beach. It was a summer brimming with activities. My mom, as director, took me and my siblings along with the students to Universal Studios and Beverly Hills and up to the Hollywood letters at Griffith Park. What lavish grace I received even as I complained about sharing my weeks with strangers.

In hindsight, Stephanie was my friend throughout the month, as were so many of the people who came to our city in Southern California for those summers. My mom modeled hospitality I didn’t understand and wouldn’t till I began to perceive God’s kindness toward me through Jesus.

Later, I’d read Ephesians (1:4-5) as a young adult and realize, like my mom, I was adopted by God. Not because I was good or hospitable, but because God welcomes us, as people he loves. People for whom he sent his Son—to bring us to himself and transform us. It’s wild. And undeserved. All those times I rolled my eyes. Now I’m writing short reflections about the global church and fitting this memory here to recall what I’m experiencing. God’s hospitality produces people who likewise love others and welcome freely.

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(Photo on Unsplash of the Oceanside pier by Mark Neal)