This weekend I spent over an hour sitting on my kitchen floor, installing fiddly locks on nine kitchen cabinets. The week before, I purchased tiny purple combination locks for my tool box. And when I go down into my workroom, where I keep all kinds of treasures, I lock the door behind me.
When I was single, the front and back doors of my house were usually locked, but everything inside was open. In those days I lived alone or, at times, with a trusted housemate, and so it was neither necessary nor convenient to bother with hiding things away inside.
Since then, over the last decade God has shown me how to open my life to others in increasingly radical ways — so why all the locks?
As with so many practices of the Way of Jesus, hospitality brings paradoxes. One of these paradoxes is that as we open the front gates and central rooms of our lives to others, it is right (and probably necessary), that we close others.
When I first lived at Community First Village!, practicing daily hospitality to formerly homeless neighbors, future neighbors still on the streets, and thousands of yearly guests, I struggled with whether or not I could withhold anything. Should I mind when Jeanie grabs the quilt off my bed to share with a guest at the campfire? Should I lend my books to anyone who asks? Should I say yes whenever a neighbor needs money or a ride to the store?
At the same time, I was a newlywed, adjusting to life with a spouse in the smallest space I’d called home since my college dorm room. Out of a sincere desire to be faithful, I initially erred on the side of opening all the doors. The result, however, was a lot of frustration, anger, and burnout.
A lot of my anger came from the same mistake I discussed in my essay on walls: because I thought that hospitality was a matter of opening up the one and only wall around my heart, welcoming anyone became costly and frightening, because those guests had access to everything I had or was.
Over time, my image of home changed from a single little house to an expansive estate: a manor with gardens, doors, and many rooms. This image allowed me to see that hospitality could mean opening some doors, while others remained shut, even locked.
Practically speaking, that means that the locus of my hospitality has moved outdoors: I spend most of my time with actual strangers in my garden. This lesson came from my years at Community First: those of us who lived there were encouraged to think of the entire 27-acre property as our home, making our personal RVs and tiny homes something more like a private chamber or bedroom. Being able to spend time with neighbors and strangers at outdoor fire pits, gardens, picnic tables, and outdoor kitchens made it feel less urgent that I have people inside my living quarters.
The paradox of locks enriching hospitality has become even more evident as I continue to learn to welcome my own children into my life. At 9 months, 3 years, and 5 years, my hobbits clamor for entrance at every door. The baby, nearly walking, is too young to know good from evil, and so I can only welcome her into rooms I have secured for her safety. The elder two, meanwhile, are in what I call the “sorcerer’s apprentice” stage of childhood. They have a beautiful desire to do all the things their father and I do, but lack the skill to handle tools safely, or to use costly materials without waste. Thus, after rebuking my son again and again for using my good peening hammer in his own construction projects, I decided that a $5 combination lock on my toolbox would do more good than continued fussing. The lock has allowed me to continue welcoming my son into our family workshop, but I no longer have to worry about my tools wandering off.
Another example: at the end of May I took the children up to visit with family, but my husband had to stay home — it doesn’t work well for a farmer to be away from his farm in the summer. During that time, Steven befriended a man who was homeless and asked if I would mind if he invited this stranger to spend the night at our house the night before Steven was going to pay this man to help him build our new chicken coop. I said yes, with the provision that Steven didn’t leave the man in our home alone. This was NOT because I think all homeless people are thieves (most aren’t), but when dealing with someone you don’t know well, creating a “lock” on certain doors protects the stranger from temptation and you from fear.
This paradox holds true in time as much as space. Earlier this year I decided to experiment with an earlier bedtime. I decided (“just for a week,” I said) to go to bed at 9 and rise at 5. As a lifelong “night owl,” I was stunned by how much this shift benefited my mood, resilience, and energy. I felt like I had discovered a treasure, and rejoiced in the ways my newfound energy made me more welcoming, patient, and productive through the day.
Since making this change, however, I have realized that if my sleep is a treasure, I must be careful to guard it. Recently, a neighbor came to talk around 8pm, and we stayed up talking until nearly 11. The next day I was too tired to rise early and write, too grumpy to tell my children stories, and too frustrated too be an effective housekeeper — all of which, in turn, made me unwilling to say yes when my husband asked if someone could come over for dinner.
That 9 o’clock bedtime, I realized, needs to be a locked door. There will always be exceptions, of course—a sick child, a neighbor’s emergency, etc.—but for the most part, keeping this door on my time locked will keep my treasure safe until it is time to use it for the good of others.
If hospitality feels overwhelming or wearisome, consider taking stock of the doors on your home and and heart. Are they all open? Are you spending more than you have to give? Ask God to show you where you might close certain doors in order to keep others open.
What rooms in your home or time do you keep locked? Have you found that locks on some parts of your life enrich hospitality?
Beautiful thoughts as always, Bethany! 💜
I feel you’ve described a way to love ourselves so we can love others. Great encouragement!! Thank you!