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If you want your child to be kind and considerate of others, you have a perfect setting in which to teach them: your home! You can encourage your children to share toys with visiting children and to speak respectfully to adults. You can involve them in making and decorating cookies for a sick friend, and then let them have the joy of taking the treats to them.

You can also show them what Gaius exemplified in this passage—true hospitality. The difference between entertaining and hospitality is this: when you entertain, you're concerned about how beautiful your table is or how clean your house is because you want to make a good impression; when you're hospitable, the focus is on the person. You seek to minister to meet that person's needs.

It's always easier to "minister" to someone you know—and that's good. But Gaius took hospitality a step further. He was hospitable to followers of the Lord whom he didn't even know (5)! The result? These followers were encouraged, and they told of his love, which strengthened others' faith in Jesus (6). (See also Jonah 1; Matthew 5:43-48; Luke 10:25-37.)

Good Words to Remember:
Beloved, you do faithfully whatever you do for the brethren and for strangers. 3 John 5

Today's Challenge:
How do you show your children the difference between entertaining and hospitality?

Bible Studies on Parenting and Family