I really enjoy October 31. It’s not just pumpkins and spice. A big part is that we’ve had young kids for the last fifteen years. Another part is that I’m a Calvinist and very happy Protestant.

Halloween presents a challenge and an opportunity to young Christian families: we don’t want to participate in or subject our kids to much of what our world celebrates. But as Christians, we’re not left helpless to cower in our basements with the lights off. Instead, we can seize Halloween as an opportunity to teach our kids about Christ’s majesty.

Even more so, the longer I live, the more precious to me is the marking of Reformation Day. It’s no accident that Halloween and Reformation Day are both October 31. November 1 has long been All Saints’ (Hallows’) Day. So, October 31 is All Hallows’ Eve. In 1517, with the holy day coming, Martin Luther chose All Hallows’ Eve for the posting of his Ninety-Five Theses on the church door in Wittenberg. In God’s good timing, that little spark spread through Europe and beyond and freed many from medieval captivity to human tradition and elementary principles (Galatians 4:3, 9; Colossians 2:8, 20).

So, October 31 offers tricks and treats alike. We’ve curated a list of resources to help your family celebrate the joys of this day and navigate its challenges — and to highlight how Christ holds all days in his sovereign hand.

Trick: Handling Halloween

Halloween is not a threat; it’s an opportunity to reassure our kids of Christ’s supreme power over all things, including spiritual darkness.

Our Lord reigns — truly reigns, right now — on the throne of the universe, over all earthly and demonic powers (Psalm 47:8; Ephesians 1:20–21). At the cross, he conquered our sin, and so “disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them” (Colossians 2:15). We want our kids to know that in Christ, “he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world” (1 John 4:4), and it’s not even a close fight between the devil and Omnipotence.

Our Sovereign permits and uses the ongoing existence of Satan and his demons for Christ’s own good purposes, as inscrutable as they are (Job 1:12). When Jesus is ready, one little word from his mouth will fell the devil (Revelation 20:10). Satan’s work in the world is real and terrible, but in Jesus, we enjoy ultimate safety. He is a reliable refuge — a castle the demons cannot crumble, a mighty fortress they cannot breach. We need not fear the night if we have the holy, delightful fear of God himself in Christ.

I’ve loved rehearsing these truths with our kids year after year. Now, my youngest daughter is almost ten. We are close to aging out of Halloween. And the older I get, the more grace I have for fellow Christians handling the loaded challenge of October 31 in a variety of ways. Our family has taken up different emphases from year to year. If your family is ready for a more aggressive, Jesus-rules-over-Satan emphasis, the resources in the link above may help.

Treat: Remembering the Reformation

Do what you will with Halloween, but I’d say at least don’t miss out on Reformation Day — even if the marking of days isn’t especially Protestant! The following resources can help shift your family’s thoughts away from ghosts and toward divine glory.

For an eleven-minute audio introduction, listen to this 2023 episode of the Ask Pastor John podcast that outlines five points to celebrate on Reformation Day: Christ’s glory, God’s free and sovereign grace, Christ’s achievement on the cross, God’s inspired word in Scripture, and the sufficiency of faith for fellowship with Christ. Before turning your attention elsewhere, know that “ultimately, we celebrate the exaltation of the glory of Christ.” That, at bottom, is the significance that makes the occasion soar.

Luther, of course, set the haunting spark in 1517. One way to observe the day would be to enjoy John Piper’s biographical message on Martin Luther from the 1996 Bethlehem Conference for Pastors. While Piper focuses on how Luther guides us to study Scripture, he also provides an engaging account of the Reformer’s life that’s sure to inspire.

If you’re short on time, a briefer but equally helpful read is Piper’s seven-hundred-word overview of Luther’s life, called “Here He Stood.” It’s part of our series “Here We Stand,” offering 31 brief audio and text profiles on various Reformers.

Luther didn’t reform alone, and the Reformation didn’t happen in Germany alone. Browse the table of contents to find a Reformer new to you. And if you’d like a personality overview in one place, I tried to make quick mention of many Reformers (with links) in an article for the five-hundredth anniversary in 2017: “Where Did the Reformation Really Begin?”

As important as knowing the tenets of the Reformation is to understand what the movement did not teach. This article series from 2022 aims to clarify points for which the Reformers labored — and allay confusion about those they didn’t. The culminating piece, Scott Hubbard’s “The Five Not-Points of Calvinism,” is a rewarding read.

For this and other pieces, Scott is one of my favorite late-October voices. Not only does he tell William Tyndale’s compelling story in “The Reformation of English,” but he also addresses the Reformers’ (many) imperfections — and even egregious flaws — in “Whitewashed Heroes.”

Finally, October 31 would be a great occasion to put the Bible itself on the screen. Watch John Piper walk through this six-part Look at the Book series that asks, Are the five solas in the Bible? Spoiler alert: Piper has Scripture for all five.

How do we avoid getting cynical in the face of people’s flaws? John Piper shows from Acts 9:18–31 how Barnabas watched for glimpses of God’s grace in others.

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Before reaching Guangzhou in 1807, missionary Robert Morrison struggled between taking the gospel to China or Timbuktu and prayed “that God would station him in that part of the missionary field where the difficulties were greatest and to all human appearances, the most insurmountable” (Growth of the Missionary Concept, 21). This was a bold prayer, a lose-your-life-and-you-will-find-it prayer (Matthew 10:39).

Although the world has turned over many times since Morrison set sail, the day of pioneer missions is not over.

First-Wave Forces

Not all missionaries are pioneers — nor should they be. Pioneers are those who first enter the darkness, men and women who take the gospel to a group of people who have yet to hear it even once. They share Paul’s boundary-pushing drive: “I make it my ambition to preach the gospel, not where Christ has already been named, lest I build on someone else’s foundation” (Romans 15:20). Other missionaries follow with equal faith, courage, and sacrifice, and have an essential role in this kingdom-building work as churches and resources take root in native soil and multiply. In this article, however, I particularly focus on the need for and characteristics of the gospel’s first-wave forces.

Pioneer missionaries are still needed today because there are vast territories and high-rise megacities where the gospel message has yet to reach. Our risen King promised the gospel would go “to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8), a beautiful and boundless phrase that speaks of both his geographic reach and his sovereign rule. Plainly, Christ intends through his word and by his Spirit that his messengers are the answer to Paul’s question in Romans 10:14: “How are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard?”

Missionary pioneers fill a unique role in the gospel’s advance. John Piper describes them as those who undertake “back-breaking, culture-penetrating, darkness-shattering initial work.” They serve where there are no churches and few — or no — believers. I don’t mean there is no particular denomination or sending agency in the area. I mean there are no churches — no gathering of believers — because there are none to gather.

On our own, the demand of evangelizing unreached millions is simply impossible — but not with God. As Christ is calling people to himself from every nation, so also he is sending them out to every nation. This is a global work for the global church. Over the years, I’ve met Brazilians, Peruvians, Arabs, Koreans, Filipinos, Chinese, Ethiopians, Dutch — men and women sent out from their churches to the forefront of gospel advance. This doesn’t mean that American churches should outsource pioneer missions — there’s plenty of work to go around. What it does mean is that we respect and rejoice in God’s work through all his people across all nations.

Profile of a Pioneer

Over the past few months, I interviewed ten pioneer missionaries to better understand the issues impacting their going — and staying — in gospel-destitute places. Their years of service ranged from 5 to 34, and their educational preparation varied from bachelor’s degrees to medical doctorates, with majors as diverse as Bible, nursing, music, and mathematics. Although they don’t fit any one mold, yet they all clearly fit the mold that God crafted for them. I noticed five common threads in their stories.

1. ENDURANCE TO STAY

First, they all possessed a particular kind of endurance to stay and serve in places of great spiritual and social isolation. Their capacity for living with uncertainty recalls the words of the intrepid British explorer Freya Stark: “One must be strong to place oneself alone against the unknown world” (Fever and Thirst, 214).

2. WISE COUNSEL

Second, most cited the impact of their pastors’ practical counsel and encouragement to go, serve, and follow Jesus. One recalled that when he was 21 and armed only with a Bible degree, he expected his pastor to recommend seminary before going. Instead, his pastor encouraged him to go, immerse himself in the language, and evangelize — and then to take seminary courses by correspondence. Looking back over thirty years of ministry, this missionary has planted churches, taken the gospel to war zones, and earned a PhD along the way. All such pioneer work began with a pastor’s encouragement to go, serve, and follow Jesus.

3. THE WORD AT WORK

Another common theme during interviews was the life-shaping force of God’s word. One missionary told me her calling came on a summer missions trip during “a deep dive [into] the book of Romans.” With Paul’s words on her mind, she said, “My heart was captured by the utter spiritual darkness — everywhere.”

Another veteran shared a similar story. As he pondered his future path one evening on a rooftop, the Muslim call to prayer sounded from minarets that spiked the cityscape. At the sound, Paul’s words came to mind: “But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God” (Acts 20:24 KJV). This verse sealed his calling to stay. As he remembered the story years later, he still teared up.

4. COMMITMENT TO LANGUAGE FLUENCY

All the pioneers I interviewed cited language fluency as a lifelong pursuit. Some are especially gifted in learning a new language, but all described it as a labor of love. As one missionary put it,

Language acquisition needs to be your number one goal. If you can’t speak fluently, you have to work at it with all your might. If we really believe in the word of God as the thing people need, then we’d better be able to communicate it. Your love for the people and your love for God’s word have to be the driving motivators for you to work on your language skills.

5. AMAZED BY GRACE

Finally, I noticed an unpretentiousness — a wonder-filled humility — among all these evangelists. As an example, one missionary I interviewed said the following:

I have thought long and hard about the question, “Was I more worthy than an uneducated Muslim fisherman on a Southeast Asian island to have had constant, immediate access to the gospel?” Of course not, but sometimes we live as if the gospel and grace we have received are somehow more deserved by us than by “them,” or that we were somehow not quite as much of an enemy of God as the people we are reaching.

Grace is still amazing to these quiet, courageous servants of the King!

Prayer for Pioneers

Although there is no job title or career path called “pioneer missionary,” there is a vital need for Christians who are passionate about spreading the good news of Jesus where he is unknown. Some of these pioneers are missionaries already on the field, pushing deeper into unreached areas. Others are praying, as Morrison did, that God would call them to a gospel-destitute place where the challenges are “to all human appearances, the most insurmountable.”

As with Christian on the way to the Celestial City, the pioneer’s path is filled with dangers, distractions, and detours. Let’s intercede for them — and pray for more to join them — as they follow Christ into the deep darkness, knowing he is with them always.

Paul sometimes speaks to believers with sobering severity. How does God use warnings like his to keep us walking with Christ until the end?

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What keeps faltering faith from final ruin? John Piper opens Luke 22:31–34 to show Christ praying for the faith of his people to not fail.

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Modern psychology defines happiness as “self-fulfillment.” But without God, our souls will always long for greater satisfaction and joy.

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The last thing I remember, before I fell into a deep sleep and dreamed a dream, was reading Jesus’s parable about the barren fig tree:

A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none. And he said to the vinedresser, “Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?” And he answered him, “Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure. Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.” (Luke 13:6–9)

Suddenly, I slid into my dream where I held a staff and traveled a narrow path. For several days I crossed river and road until, famished, I approached a fruit tree. Delighted at the sight of green foliage — God’s advertisement of fruit — I reached my hand among its branches . . . in vain.

I tried another side and another branch: leaves. I made my way around the whole tree, and even climbed it to see whether food dwelled outside the reach of hungry animals like myself. But no. Nothing. Only leaves.

“What a worthless tree,” I mumbled in my disappointment.

“What a worthless fellow,” the tree snapped back.

Fruitless Tree

Unaccustomed to speaking trees, I fell from its crown. The tree’s deep groans escorted me to the ground, as did the branches that fell with me like Lucifer’s angels.

“You can talk!” I exclaimed after I hit the ground, one part amazed, the other part embarrassed.

“You can hear!” barked the tree. “Tell me, is it your usual business to harass innocent strangers and then insult them for their trouble?”

“It is not,” I said, bewildered to be answering a tree. “But my stomach protests with hunger, and you are a fruit tree, after all. Where is your fruit?”

“Young man, my roots drew from this earth decades before you first climbed a branch to steal what you never produced,” the tree said haughtily. “If wisdom did not mention it already, let me now: Speak mindfully to your elders, and don’t presume to ever judge another’s fruit.”

“But do you not see that there is no fruit either to eat or to judge? I simply ask because I care about your soul.”

“Yes, yes, you are the second person to come to me this week — searching for fruit, questioning my profession, dressing your censure as ‘concern for my soul,’” the tree said with an impatient rustle of its leaves. “I will say, at least you did not declare that I ‘use up the ground,’ nor did you threaten to return next year to evaluate my fruit again. Every year this traveler comes judging, inspecting. His companion had to intercede to spare me his hot displeasure. Down with me, according to him, if I fail to meet his satisfaction the next year.”

“Do you not tremble,” I asked, “whether that was the Great Master of the vineyard? Has he no right to come and uproot you if you refuse to live as he has called you? You are his, on his land, owing all to him, no? Furthermore, you are bound, are you not, to be in fact what you profess? If a man be a doctor, he must, in fact, doctor. If he is a Christian, he must walk as Christ did. Better a wingless bird, a finless fish, or a heightless mountain than a mocking, fruitless fruit tree.”

“I do more than is required of me,” declared the tree, “and certainly more than others do. Upright enough, healthy enough, I grow upward to the heavens and color the blue with green leaves. I sound music as the breeze rustles through my many arms. My leaves feed hungry caterpillars below, and my branches shelter birds above. I am plenty useful in my own way. I have no doubt the King will commend me when I address him most affectionately as ‘Lord, Lord’” (Matthew 7:22).

Evergreen Tree

“But a fruit tree ought to be more than a provider for caterpillars,” I protested. “And as far as you doing more than others, I cannot agree with that for a moment. Just along this path I came across a tree by a stream that yielded me fruit in its season (Psalm 1:3), as well as a grapevine in the vineyard offering the most succulent grapes. Both met my need right perfectly.”

“Ah, so young in seasons, yet so old in opinions,” the tree said with a yawn. “Yes, let’s review these two others that you seem so taken with. First, the tree planted down by the river. I’ve heard the accolades of how evergreen it remains, no matter the winter. I will not deny it has borne fruit for many a traveler along the way, such that songs sing of it as ‘blessed’ (Psalm 1:1). So, sure. It can give some idle vagabonds such as yourself a free meal. But have you noticed its terrible isolation? Oh, how horribly it sets itself apart!”

“But doesn’t it set itself apart because it seeks after God, rather than worldly things?” I countered.

“Huh! So it claims, but at what cost?” said the tree. “It refuses most ardently to fraternize with people unlike itself, it rejects counsel that doesn’t meet its lofty standards, and worst of all, it cannot take a joke. Its otherness is so tedious that I, a fruit tree myself, cannot abide its company for very long. And consider how it always is mumbling the Lord’s teaching to itself. Oversaved is my description, since you pushed me to it. It is in this world, but not really of it — and this can hardly be its purpose. Why is it still here if it imagines its native soil to be elsewhere? My motto has ever been, ‘Home is just beneath your trunk.’”

Fruit of the Vine

“And what of those branches yielding fruit of the Vine?” I asked.

“Oh, my dear fellow, you must not know,” said the tree. “To think that anyone would want to be that miserable vine, no matter how much fruit it bore! You must be ignorant of the rumors. Its owner is most watchful and abusive. He walks around with a knife, they say, looking for branches to snip and leaves to cut. He makes it his business to be lopping and hacking and cutting away — who could possibly desire such a life? If ten grapes emerged where one arm or hand or eye was cut off, I for one should never make the exchange (Matthew 5:29–30).”

“But surely,” I interrupted, “you desire to bear good fruit? Surely, as the Master of the orchard comes by, you wish to yield that which is to his pleasure? Could there be any greater honor than for a fruit tree to offer its fruit to the King and the King’s people? He doesn’t need it, of course, but to be who he made you to be — and for that to be enjoyed by the Lord — is that not your very purpose?”

“Ah, now I see you plainly enough: You cannot even pronounce grace,” said the tree. “You worship Moses, with his laws and warnings and foreboding skies. I live under the sunshine of mercy. My overseer does not insist on a holy life and a holy way, for this would be to try to merit our salvation. Thus, your idle concerns do not move me; I am rooted in the opinion that God is not overly scrupulous concerning what you might call repentance, holiness, or good works.”

“But I have heard it said that faith without works is dead,” I said, my distress growing by the minute (James 2:17). “Anyone who does not abide in the Vine is thrown away and withers (John 15:6). We are not saved by our works, it is true. We bear fruit through our abiding in him. But a faith that doesn’t bear fruit? Can that faith save him? (James 2:14).”

“Grieve for me all you like, threaten to wither me, curse me, cut me down — these are the empty threats of the law from which I am most decidedly set free,” the tree said, its leaves quivering in agitation. “I shall not bend my branches to any legal religion. Show yourself your faith by your works all you want to your own boasting, but I shall show you my faith by my faith. I need nothing but leaves; my Master shall bring all that is required. Your cursing and complaining is the voice of the enemy, not that of everlasting mercy.”

Wake Up and Live

I awoke in a cold sweat. What became of the ignorant tree? Did he finally “bear fruit in keeping with repentance” (Matthew 3:8)? Did he get cut down to his utter astonishment? Did he abide in the Lord and grow in holiness and love, or did he end his days presuming on grace, ultimately dying with an empty religion? Did he discover the glory of a useful life in the Lord’s service empowered by grace? Or was he horrified at the Lord’s return?

Reader, let us learn the lesson of Jesus’s parable: Lips of religion are nothing without a heart and life that follow. Joyfully abide in him and go forth bearing fruit, lest he return and find your branches bare.

The line between a carnal Christian and an unbeliever is a dangerous one. Conduct demonstrates the reality of the new birth — or the lack of it.

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We’ve probably all had the sad experience of watching someone we love walk away from the faith they’ve professed. We witnessed their baptism. We heard their testimony. Or perhaps we didn’t know them personally, but we enjoyed listening to their music or reading their books. But now they say that they no longer believe in Jesus or the Bible — at least not as they did before. Whether they’ve turned to skepticism, Hinduism, or transgenderism, in current lingo they’ve “deconstructed” or “deconverted”; in older parlance, they’ve “apostatized.”

As we listen to deconversion narratives, we’re often not sure how to feel. If we take the accounts at face value, we might feel pity or admiration. After all, perhaps such people wanted Christianity to be true, but they could no longer bear the intellectual strain of reconciling apparent contradictions in Scripture. Perhaps they had a non-Christian friend who died tragically, and they couldn’t bear the thought of him being in hell. Or maybe they saw gaping moral hypocrisy in the pastor who had discipled them, and it shattered their trust. In these narratives, those deconstructing often appear as victims betrayed by ultraconservative believers or as heroes driven by intellectual courage (or both).

But before we walk down this road too far, we need to pause and ask, How does God view deconversion? Hebrews 10:29 provides us with a sobering vision of apostasy. The more we imbibe this vision, the more we will see apostasy as God sees it: as the ultimate act of betrayal and disloyalty, deserving of divine judgment.

Rejecting God’s Grace

Hebrews is full of passages that warn against turning away from Jesus and back to old-covenant Judaism. Hebrews 10:26–29 is the climactic warning, coming at the end of a long section unpacking the superior priesthood and sacrifice of Jesus (4:14–10:18). In it, the writer alerts us to the danger of rejecting God’s grace in Christ:

If we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? (10:26–29)

These verses convey a startling lack of sympathy for people enticed back to Judaism, even though they had endured significant suffering. We’re later told that these believers had faced “reproach and affliction,” with some going to prison and others having their property plundered (10:32–34). Surely, we could understand why victims of such trauma might seek shelter in a more accepted religion, especially when that religion was one that God himself had once ordained. But the author doesn’t share that understanding. To him, such a person has “trampled the Son of God underfoot.” This language inspires no sympathy for the trampler.

Trampling the Son of God

A memorable scene in Robert Louis Stevenson’s Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde illustrates the metaphor. On a dark street late at night, Mr. Hyde accidentally collides with a little girl running toward a corner. But instead of helping her up, Mr. Hyde steps on her, producing screams of pain. Before long, Hyde is surrounded by an angry mob demanding justice.

People will celebrate you for some sins, but trampling on an innocent person isn’t one of them. That’s how God views apostasy — except you’re trampling on Jesus. If someone deconstructs for the “right” reason, the world will support them, at least for a little while. But when they stand in judgment on the last day, the cruelty of their treason will be laid bare, and the world will turn on them like the mob around Mr. Hyde. If you receive the message of a crucified Messiah only to re-crucify him later, then even the men of Nineveh will rise up and condemn you (Hebrews 6:6; Matthew 12:41).

People “died without mercy” for abandoning Moses’s words (Hebrews 10:28), and Jesus is far greater than Moses, worthy of far more glory (3:3). Trampling on Jesus, then, will bring a “worse punishment.” And according to Hebrews, this punishment will be “deserved” (12:28–29).

The point is not to kindle hate against those who apostatize or to lose all pity for them. But it is to warn us about the seriousness of what they’re doing, lest we minimize their sin or follow their example.

Remember Judgment Day

Picture a person who deconstructs after their pastor committed sexual abuse. They leave the church and then throw themselves into advocacy for abuse victims. In their efforts, they declare substitutionary atonement a cruel teaching that enables abuse.

We may sympathize with this person, but if we think that on judgment day Jesus will condone their choices, we haven’t absorbed Hebrews 10:29. It’s true that leaders will bear a heavy responsibility for those whom they caused to stumble through their hypocrisy. But Jesus also warned us that ravenous wolves would come in sheep’s clothing (Matthew 7:15), so no one should be totally taken off guard. Hypocrisy and abuse should rightly stir us to anger and grief, but they should also drive us to Christ, not away from him. We can’t conflate the sins of the church with the one who died to save us. When we do, we trample Christ — and invite his judgment.

Jesus called the believers in the book of Hebrews to follow him even at risk to their own safety. His bar for us isn’t any lower. He calls us to be faithful to him in a world of plausible-sounding lies and excuses (Matthew 10:16–23; John 8:44). And when he listens to deconversion stories, he isn’t nearly as impressed as we might be. Not only does he see apostasy for what it is, but as the one trampled, he feels it.

We must learn to feel it too, so that we don’t trample on him. It’s not wrong to view apostasy through the eyes of the apostate. But that can’t be our main lens. We need to see apostasy as God sees it: as an act of treachery and betrayal that Jesus takes personally.

So when you hear deconversion stories, don’t be swayed. Instead, pray for the fallen. Plead for God to give them eyes to see. Pray that he would put his fear into their hearts (Jeremiah 32:40). Ask him to guard you against the deception that has drawn them away. And through it all, pray that Christ would be exalted, his Spirit honored, and his saints kept to the end.

We all agree that hospitality is wonderful. The Bible commands it: “Show hospitality to one another without grumbling” (1 Peter 4:9). The picture of people surrounding your table laughing and eating is a rosy scene indeed. And certainly, it’s something we’d like to practice — if only the schedule were not so tight, the windows not so very smudged, and our entryway not so often overflowing with baggage. We don’t live in a serene and bedewed scene from a Martha Stewart magazine. Rather, we’re panting in our efforts not to fall off the treadmill of life. To open our door to more people feels like an overwhelming, intimidating exercise; life is hard enough without it.

It’s true that hospitality is hard work. If it were nothing more than the secular version of “entertaining,” with no greater payoff than socializing or posturing, then certainly I would opt out when the going got tough. But Christian hospitality is more than a pretty table; it’s a great weapon God has given the local church to sharpen, strengthen, encourage, and build one another up in our faith. And I write this with a broken dishwasher and three hospitality events this week!

So let’s reassess the stakes and rightly interpret the goal. Why is hospitality such an indispensable feature for life in Christ? Consider six ways hospitality serves as a weapon of grace in the fight for faith.

1. We welcome and deepen relationships.

In every era of redemptive history, table fellowship stands as a profound expression of welcome. Look at some Old Testament stories:

• Abraham welcomed three angelic strangers (Genesis 18:1–5).
• Moses and seventy elders of Israel ate and drank in God’s presence on Mount Sinai (Exodus 24:9–11).
• David showed mercy to Saul’s grandson, Mephibosheth, inviting him to share the king’s table (2 Samuel 9:6–7).

The practice continues into the New Testament. Consider the early church, who forged fellowship through the daily breaking of bread together (Acts 2:46). No less today will we find that we can “welcome one another as Christ has welcomed [us]” at our tables (Romans 15:7). When we gather together to share a meal, we physically embody the psalmist’s cry: “As for the saints in the land, they are the excellent ones, in whom is all my delight” (Psalm 16:3).

2. We set an example for other believers.

Consider Paul’s instructions to “join in imitating me, and keep your eyes on those who walk according to the example you have in us” (Philippians 3:17). Or remember his call to practice “what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me” (Philippians 4:9). This kind of lived-out example implies a richer shared experience than just the time spent gathered as a church for worship.

My family has enjoyed such experiences firsthand. When my husband and I were newlyweds, we joined a small group of empty nesters. What a gift it was to witness warm, gospel-aged marriages when we were just acclimating to life together. And what a wealth of insights we gained from more experienced parents as we first navigated toddlers or bridged into the nurture of school-aged children. As time has passed, God has blessed us not only as recipients of hospitality but also through opportunities to show hospitality to others. Now we often have the joy of welcoming middle schoolers, high schoolers, parents, and families around our table.

Scripture calls mature men (2 Timothy 2:2) and women (Titus 2:4) to invest their years of godly life and experience in those who follow them; opening your home provides a warm and personal context for doing so.

3. We detect sin and fight for faith with other believers.

Casual conversation in the church hallway may be a meaningful touchpoint, but often it is insufficient for truly knowing and being known by God’s people. As Hebrews 3:12–13 urges, “Take care, brothers, lest there be in any of you an evil, unbelieving heart, leading you to fall away from the living God. But exhort one another every day, as long as it is called ‘today,’ that none of you may be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin.”

Not only does sin tempt us to mask its presence from others in superficial relationships, but it also deceives and numbs us to its real depth and toxicity. Too often, when left to our own devices, our apathy deepens and we rationalize or minimize bad habits, like a drunkard who is sure he can stop any time he wants. Ongoing fellowship, with its gift of fresh perspective and mutual accountability, is a crucial defense against unbelief and the creep of subtle sins.

4. We bear one another’s burdens.

If you have ever joined a new church, spent a holiday alone, or struggled through a season of suffering, you may relate to the balm of hospitality: the gift of food to nourish your belly and caring conversation to refresh your soul. In times of crisis or celebration, the simple provision of food and someone with whom to share it conveys a disproportionate amount of care. It’s an exercise in rejoicing with those who rejoice and weeping with those who weep (Romans 12:15).

Perhaps you worry your hospitality is too simple and unrefined. Remember what Proverbs 15:17 says: “Better is a dinner of herbs where love is than a fattened ox and hatred with it.” Truly, if you have received pizza on paper plates from a joyful and caring host, you know the soul nourishment that may come through even the smallest offerings of warm hospitality.

5. We declare the goodness of God and the sweetness of the gospel.

God created the crispness and tenderness of roasted potatoes, the juiciness of a grilled burger, and the melting notes of brown sugar and butter ribboned with chocolate in fresh chocolate chip cookies. For little children, for teenagers — for all of us — savoring God’s delicious gifts shapes an exclamation point to our convictions about God’s goodness, God’s generosity, and God’s grace.

As believers, we trace the beam of good food and shared fun up to the blazing source, our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. May our homes be full of object lessons declaring, “Oh, taste and see that the LORD is good!” (Psalm 34:8).

6. We sharpen our understanding of the truth.

During the Reformation, swaths of people underwent a radical transformation in their understanding of Christ, the church, and the nature of salvation by grace through faith. One crucial component of this cultural renewal was a robust space for connection: meals and conversations hosted by Martin and Katie Luther. Centuries later, a similar hotbed of fruitful Christian witness, reflection, and sharpening flourished during the gatherings of the Inklings. Authors such as J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis bantered, honed ideas, and traded encouragement and insight over food and drink at a local residence or pub.

Such table fellowship is central to gospel life. When Peter traded meals with every tribe and tongue for fellowship only with those who upheld Jewish customs, Paul rebuked him for distorting the truth of the gospel (Galatians 2:12–14). How powerful the opposite example must be: We point to the unifying work of Christ by opening our table wide, foreshadowing the expansiveness of “the marriage supper of the Lamb” (Revelation 19:7–9).

Grace Between Two Feasts

The Bible opens and closes with portraits of God’s lavish personal communion with his people amid food and fellowship (Genesis 1:29–30; Revelation 19:6–9). And for us — God’s children, living between those two garden feasts — hospitality means gutsy, gritty gatherings where we give and receive grace. The labor sometimes feels strenuous. The conversation or connections may not always be smooth and seamless. However, keeping our eyes on the fruit of this investment may spur us on when the cost seems high.

Let’s wield the common grace of food and hospitality. Let’s not allow a full schedule or the fleeting ideal of a spotless home to overwhelm the vision of great fruit that may come through small steps of faith-filled fellowship. Feast together to fight.