Hospitality as Ministry: Opening a Messy Home with Grace
The doorbell rang and I stepped over a pile of laundry to answer it. There was a straw wrapper stuck to the leg of my jeans and I could see a smudge of something on the kitchen window from where the toddler touched it with sticky hands and I had a moment where I almost apologized before I even opened the door.
But I opened it anyway. An older woman from the ward stood there with a casserole dish and she looked past me at the chaos on the living room floor and she smiled, not the polite smile but the real one. She said "Oh thank goodness. I thought I was the only one."
I almost didn't write this because hospitality advice is everywhere and most of it makes me feel worse. But that woman on my doorstep reminded me of something I keep forgetting. Opening your home to someone really is about letting them in without trying to be impressive about it.
Christian Hospitality vs Performative Hosting
I think somewhere along the way I got the idea that hospitality was about presentation. That having people over meant the house should look a certain way and the food should be impressive and the children should be on their best behavior. I would spend the whole day cleaning and the whole evening anxious and by the time the guests left I was too tired to enjoy that we had even spent time together.
I wrote about this a little in Low-Pressure Hospitality: Open Your Home Without Losing Your Mind but I keep coming back to the same realization. The gospels show Jesus eating with people who were not ready and not clean and not impressive. He didn't wait for the right table setting. He showed up at the table that was already there.
"And it came to pass, as Jesus sat at meat in the house, behold, many publicans and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples." (Matthew 9:10)
That verse hits me hard every time I read it with publicans and sinners at the table, not a prepared guest list and not a perfectly arranged home. Just a meal and a willingness to be with people who needed to be with him. I think that's the version of hospitality we're actually supposed to be practicing.
LDS Hospitality Tips for Messy Homes
I don't have a system for making my house look like nobody lives here because four people live here and so does a cat and so does a collection of rocks on the windowsill that nobody will throw away. But I have learned a few things that made the door easier to open.
The first is that I stopped cleaning the rooms nobody will see. The guest will sit in the kitchen and the living room and maybe the bathroom. They won't inspect the kids' bedrooms or the hall closet. I clean the spaces they'll actually be in and I let the rest go.
The second is that I stopped pretending the mess isn't there. If the laundry pile is visible I say something about it. "Sorry about the laundry. It's been a week." Every single time the other person says something like "Oh I have a pile exactly like that" and suddenly we're talking about real things instead of the weather.
The third is that I serve food that doesn't make me nervous. Cheese and crackers and apples and a store-bought dessert is a perfectly good meal. I don't need to prove I can cook a complicated dinner. I need to prove I'm glad they came.
Overcoming Anxiety About Inviting People Over
The anxiety is real and I don't want to pretend it isn't. There are still days when I see a car pull into the driveway and I do a quick scan of the living room and feel the panic rising. But I've started asking myself a different question. Instead of "is the house good enough?" I ask "am I ready to be with this person?"
And the answer to that one is almost always yes. The house may not be ready but I am. I want to hear about their week and I want my kids to know them and I want to sit on the couch and laugh about something ordinary. That's the part that matters.
I think about what I actually remember from the times people have opened their homes to me. I don't remember the decorations or the cleanliness of the baseboards but I do remember how I felt when I walked in and the warmth and the welcome and the way someone handed me a cup of tea and said "sit down, tell me everything."
How to Make Guests Feel Welcome in a Home with Children
My children are loud and they are everywhere and they will almost certainly show you something they made out of paper and tape. For years I tried to keep them contained when guests came over and it made everyone miserable. The kids felt like they were in trouble and the guests felt like they had interrupted something.
Now I let them be part of it. The toddler brings her favorite stuffed animal to show the visitor, the second-grader offers to show them her room, the middle-schooler comes downstairs and says hi before going back to whatever he was doing. The teenager stays in her room and that's fine too.
Having children in the house when guests arrive is not a hosting failure. It's the actual point. The guests are coming to see your family, not a show about your family. Let them see the real thing.
Creating a Sanctuary Home LDS
I keep coming back to the idea that a home doesn't have to be perfect to be a sanctuary. In fact I think a too-perfect home can feel like the opposite of a sanctuary. It can feel like a place where you have to be careful, where you can't put your feet up, where you have to watch what you touch.
A sanctuary is a place where people feel safe being themselves and that means the couch has worn spots, the coffee table has water rings, and there are crayons in the cracks of the dining table and nobody is embarrassed about it.
I wrote about some of this in Ministry of the Unprepared Home: Holiness in Parenting's Mess. The holiness of a home comes from the state of the welcome, not from anything on the walls or the floors.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do I deal with the fear that people will judge my messy house?
Most people are too worried about how they are coming across to spend much time judging your baseboards. And the ones who do judge probably aren't the ones you want to invite back. When you're honest about the mess you give other people permission to be honest about theirs.
Does low-pressure hospitality mean I should stop cleaning my house?
Not at all. It means you clean for health and comfort instead of for performance. A swept floor and a clean bathroom matter. A showroom living room does not. Clean what needs cleaning and let the rest be the evidence that real people live there.
How can I involve my children in hospitality without it becoming overwhelming?
Give them one small job like showing a guest where the bathroom is, or offering a drink, or taking a coat. One job lets them feel like part of the welcome without putting pressure on them to perform. And if they forget or get distracted, let that go too.
The doorbell rang and I stepped over a laundry pile to answer it and that woman from the ward reminded me that nobody is looking for a perfect home and never was. They're looking for a real one. So I'm going to keep opening the door even when the house is a wreck. The mess keeps showing up but the welcome matters most of all.
with love, Melissa