I just received my copy of Practicing Hospitality from Crossway Books and 
I am so excited.
If you remember from this post, I will be participating in an online book study of this very book. Each week, starting January 26th (The start date has been changed to Feb. 1st), we will be reading one chapter of the book. If you are interested in participating, visit Lindsay at Passionate Homemaking and then grab a copy of the book!
I just couldn’t wait until January 26th (The start date has been changed to Feb. 1st), so I went ahead and read the Foreword and Introduction (Here is the Foreword, Introduction, and Chapter 1, it is a PDF). I just have to say that already I am so impressed with this book.
I love my role as a wife and keeper of my home and I feel so blessed to be able to live out my roles daily. I feel like the Christian Family and Home is one of the most powerful tools for evangelism in today’s culture, and I have a duty to harness that power as a wife and keeper of the home. I think that this book is going to help me understand so much more and help me learn more about reaching out to the world through my home.
I hope that you are getting just as excited as I am about this book!!!
The authors, Pat Ennis and Lisa Tatlock, seem like they have spent a lot of time learning about this topic of hospitality and the home. They are both very well trained to teach about: Dr. Ennis chairs the Home Economics department at The Master’s College and Dr. Tatlock has taught home economics at The Master’s College since 1988.
Here is something that really stuck out for me in the Foreword, written by Dorothy Kelly Patterson:
Hospitality has never been about having House Beautiful with perfectly coordinated accessories and the most up-to-date equipment, nor is it dependent upon having large chunks of leisure time and a big entertainment budget to spend, nor does it call for special training in culinary arts or event planning. Hospitality is about a heart for service, the creativity to stretch whatever we do have available, and the energy to give the time necessary to add a flourish to the ordinary events of life.
WOW! That is so true and yet so forgotten in our culture. Everyone can practice hospitality, you don’t need the perfect house in the perfect order with extra money to make fancy food. You can practice hospitality right where you are and with what you have!
I absolutely cannot wait until this book study starts! Will you be joining me?
Just glancing over the PDF (not reading it all the way through) and I already want to join in. Thanks for posting about it.
Like I said, I haven’t read through the entire book (Just the foreword and intro). But, in the little that I have read, I am already so impressed and challenged!
I would recommend any Christian woman to join this book study. I believe everyone will get something out of it!
-Ashley
Thanks for your heart in doing this. It is much appreciated by us here at Crossway, and I certainly trust it will benefit those involved.
I want the book … here is another entry. Hee hee
[...] Foreword and Introduction [...]