God is a God who loves our prayers and takes them serious. When we bought our house last year we made sure it is close enough that our Ocean View friends can walk to us and visit us. We prayed that our house will serve God and we as a family are part of his mission. We also prayed that they will come. Many people in South Africa are very cautious about security and live often in secured complexes or behind electric fences. When we choose the location of our house we wanted to be as open as possible, so people will not be turned away from security guards if they come and visit us.
There we are... living in a place where people find a place for a nice chat, an intense mentoring or just a good coffee. We have people coming (sometimes every day) to our house to often very inconvenient times. If you just get up in the morning and rushing around in your pijamas and getting your kids ready for school, you maybe don’t want to be seen or chat about the newest music project of one of your HopeTown boys. But it is important to them and why do they show up so early in the morning to tell you this? Maybe they need an open ear to hear their passion and excitement and maybe they love to have a piece of bread in the morning on your table?
There is a price to pay if you live a hospitable life with an open door, where people see your mess or your breakfast becomes also their breakfast.
There is a price to pay if you live a hospitable life with an open door, where people see your mess or your breakfast becomes also their breakfast.
Also back in Switzerland we always had an open door for all kind of people. We had drug addicts sleeping in our place or uninvited guests turned up in the middle of the night. To live in South Africa hasn’t changed our commitment towards our values even it is more dangerous here.
If you live a life with an open door you never know what is happening the next day, but life also becomes so adventurous. Yes, sometimes we do tell them, today we don’t have time or we just have other guest in the house. You know what? They can handle this. They love our honesty and even sometimes tiredness. They realise we are needy too.
An open door doesn’t mean to be available for 24 hours and to be manipulated by people. It only means, we share our lives with the capacity we have. But I wouldn’t trade it for anything else. I saw miracles happening in our house, just because we opened the door. God is a good God - he takes our prayers serious and testing our availability. Are we ready for this?