The Amazing Power of Welcome

Whenever someone comes to our door, I have an audio memory of my father’s voice calling out to my mother, “Oh, Wilma, guess who’s at our front door!”

That warm, ingratiating greeting was both a harbinger, then the ideal, for how to greet the people—friends or strangers—who have come to our front door, rung the bell, or knocked loudly. And believe me, through the 62 years of our married life, literally hundreds of people, invited or uninvited, have taken the one-step-up on our outside stoop.

New neighbors behind us have three adorable school-age girls—Jane and Ivy and Athena. David, my husband, and I love it when they cross the back yard and knock on the kitchen door because they have something to tell us or show us. We love it so much, we installed a doorbell that is just for them to ring.

Extending welcome, greeting visitors warmly (no matter their ages) has a more powerful effect than most of us understand. It’s the smile that says, “Oh, it is so good to see you!” It’s the hand extended that accompanies the words, “Oh, come in. Do come in.”

Welcome actually is more profound than the greeting, than the smile, then the extended hand. This profundity—the realization that we are accepted and our presence is wanted—can have more than surface impact. It can help to heal deep wounds resulting from not feeling welcomed or wanted. It can give us an undeniable gift of feeling “at home” even when we are in someone else’s home, or office, or yard, or workspace.

For the Christian, welcome is a way to extend the very Presence of Christ. Most of us don’t consider this reality nearly enough.

There is a broad instruction in Romans 15:7, “Therefore welcome one another as Christ has welcomed you for the glory of God.” But Christ’s words as recorded in Matthew 25:35–36 are much more specific:

If this is actually true, we need to “Christify” our giving of welcome. We need to consciously remember that when we welcome another, when we greet casually, when we extend welcome to our own family, we are modeling the welcome of Christ.

Years after graduating from high school, a casual friend from those earlier days contacted me to let me know she had become a Christian. She dropped by our home because she was in town. For no reason that I could identify, this woman mentioned my father’s welcome (“Look who has come to our door!”). She said to me, “I wish I had had a father like you had.”

The power of welcome must be extended to all—even the problematic personality, the guest who arrives uninvited at the most inopportune of times, those who come for a planned event but when everything (and I mean EVERYTHING) that has gone awry in the kitchen—a pot has boiled over, a plate has fallen and shattered on the floor, the cat has jumped on the dining table and overturned a water goblet—and housemates have felt the pressure, resulting in some harsh asides. We still must extend warm and delighted welcome. We may even laugh together—guest and host—over the all-too-frequent truism: Everything that can go wrong will go wrong.

Remember—no matter the circumstances—true welcome, deeply felt and lavishly extended—is powerful. And when we extend welcome to one another, it not only mirrors the welcome Christ has extended to all, it imparts in some strange and inexplicable way Christ’s healing and inviting Presence.

Yep! Let us consider the amazing power of welcome. Think a little more deeply about this topic: Who is one person in your life who has extended welcome to you? What did their welcome mean to you?

Karen Mains

NOTICES

Welcome Signs

A while back, I designed a "welcome" sign of my own—and I have given several framed copies to friends, neighbors and family. It reads:

Welcome all who enter here.
If you come alone, we extend friendship.
If you come weary, we offer rest.
If you come rejoicing, we will rejoice with you.
If you mourn, we share your sadness; we, too, have suffered loss.
If you need refuge, we welcome the refugee in body or soul.
If you need love, we have love to spare.
If you need a taste of home, consider ours your own.
If you need quiet, we are peace-loving.
We are deeply, genuinely glad that you have come.
Step inside. Take deep breaths. Rest. Relax.
You are safe within.

CLICK HERE if you would like to view the sign as designed. You are free to download it, print it, put it in your own home, give it as a gift to others.

I went on Etsy and found a variety of handmade "Welcome to Our Home" signs. You might consider finding one that you like and purchasing it for your own home—or even create your own "home-made" one!

One of many "Welcome to Our Home" signs on Etsy

David & Karen's Podcast

David and I recorded a Before We Go podcast episode on welcoming. #214, “The Power of Welcome,” is online at www.BeforeWeGo.show, along with all the other episodes. Love to hear your stories on this topic.

Karen Mains

BOOK CORNER

Hotel Oscar Mike Echo
by Linda MacKillop

From the book description:

Home isn’t always what we dream it will be.

Eleven-year-old Sierra just wants a normal life. After her military mother returns from the war overseas, the two hop from home to homelessness while Sierra tries to help her mom through the throes of PTSD.

When they end up at a shelter for women and children, Sierra is even more aware of what her life is not. The kind couple who run the shelter, Mr. and Mrs. Goodwin, attempt to show her parental love as she faces the uncertainties of her mom’s emotional health and the challenges of being the brand-new poor kid in middle school. The longer she stays at the shelter, the more Sierra realizes she may have to face an impossible choice as she redefines home.

This middle-grade novel offers a compassionate look at poverty, homelessness, and hope. Readers walk alongside brave Sierra as she holds on to a promise she believes God gave her: that one day she will have a real home. But what if that promise looks far different than she has ever dreamed?

Buy From Amazon.com