By Stephen Mitchell
Hospitality! From the very beginning of the Church, hospitality was an important part of Christian fellowship. The Apostles could not have gone from house to house, breaking bread and fellowshipping together if there had not been a corresponding hospitality from the host families (Acts 2:46). Anyone being considered for a pastorate was required to be of a hospitable nature (1Timothy 3:2 and Titus 1:8). A widow could only be considered for church support if she had shown hospitality over the years (1Timothy 5:10). Peter wrote that we should show hospitality to fellow Believers while the writer of Hebrews encouraged us to show hospitality to strangers (1Peter 4:9 and Hebrews 13:2). Paul also instructed those in Rome to practice hospitality (Romans 12:13). This was especially important for them since they lived in the capital city of the empire and there would be many Believers who would have need of traveling there.
Jesus enjoyed the hospitality of many. He stayed in Peter’s home. He enjoyed many hours with Lazarus and his two sisters. He shared a meal with Matthew, the tax collector. He enjoyed a meal and was anointed in the home of Simon, the leper and Pharisee. He invited Himself to stay in the home of another tax collector, Zaccheus. And he even spent a Sabbath meal under hostile eyes in the home of a chief of the Pharisees. Each of these times Jesus had the pleasure of someone’s hospitality, even when the host held enmity towards Jesus.
Hospitality was very necessary because the early church was a church on the move. From the New Testament alone we find the Apostle Paul journeyed many miles. As an enemy of the church, Paul journeyed about 135 miles to Damascus. In his 1st missionary journey he traveled about 1,400 miles. For his 2nd missionary journey Paul traveled around 2,800 miles. For his 3rd he went a little less, somewhere around 2,700 miles. As a prisoner he journeyed 2,250 miles to Rome. For each of these trips he went by a combination of land and sea.
With Paul went many companions: Timothy, Titus, Tychicus, Barnabas, Luke, Sopater, John Mark, Silas, Silvanus, Secundus, Demas, Erastus, Aristarchus, Trophimus, Priscilla and Aquilla, at different times. Titus, Trophimus, Erastus and Timothy were sent off by Paul to travel to other places at different times. Not only Paul and his companions traveled; churches also sent representatives to meet with Paul. Stephanus, Fortunatus, and Achaicus traveled the 430 miles from Corinth to Paul in Ephesus, bringing him a letter and provisions. Epaphroditus traveled the 800 miles from Philippi to Rome, bringing gifts to Paul from the Philippian church. While there Epaphroditus became deathly ill and the church in Philippi heard about it. That means someone had to travel back to Philippi with the news prior to Epaphroditus’ return trip with the letter to the Philippians. Tychicus traveled from Rome to Ephesus and then on to Colossae, accompanied by Onesmius, bearing letters from Paul, a total distance of about 1,400 miles. Apollos traveled to Ephesus and then to Corinth, left there at some point, and planned to travel back to Corinth. After Paul was freed from his imprisonment in Rome, he traveled to Ephesus with Timothy and Titus, left Timothy in Ephesus and traveled to northern Greece. From Philippi he sent someone to Ephesus with a letter for Timothy. He then traveled to Crete, left Titus in Crete and traveled to Nicopolis on the western coast of southern Greece. From there he sent Artemus or Trophimus with a letter for Titus in Crete, asking Titus to come meet him in Nicopolis. From there he sent Titus to Dalmatia, today’s former Yugoslavia. Paul then traveled to Troas where he was rearrested and taken to Rome. Paul asked Timothy to pick up a cloak at Troas and get to him in Rome before winter, a distance of close to 1,000 miles. In all of this, on land, travelers made anywhere from 15-25 miles a day. When Peter traveled from Joppa to Caesarea to meet with Cornelius, a distance of 40 miles, it took him two days to arrive, an average of 20 miles a day.
What does this all have to do with hospitality? Travelers would often take tents with them to camp out beside the road, but this was not always safe (recall that Paul was a tent maker by trade). And every traveler, most often on foot, had to carry their food as well as the means to prepare it, on their backs. Inns in the Roman empire were usually not desirable places to stay. The poet Horace referred to one spot as “full of nasty tavern keepers.”
While there were probably several different accommodations available in towns, outside of the major population centers things were different.
The traveler “most often put up at an inn, and even respectable inns, the ones the Romans generally dignified by the neutral terms hospitium ‘place for hospitality’ or deversorium ‘place for turning aside’, included prostitutes among the services offered, while the kind they called a caupona was distinctly low class: it catered to sailors and carters and slaves; its dining-room had more the atmosphere of a saloon than a restaurant; and the caupo (or copo), as one who ran a caupona was called, was of the same social and moral level as his establishment. Indeed, caupones, along with ships’ captains and owners of livery stables, were the subject of special legislation, since a traveler was completely at their mercy, and the law was aware that, as a group, they were hardly noted for scrupulous honesty.” (Casson, 204)
Often the travelers would spend many hours over their wine, loudly singing hymns to whatever deity/ies they served, in their revelry. As such, the Christian traveler would frequently find their surroundings difficult to endure.
Camping out, in danger from thieves and brigands, was often the only other option, unless local Christians offered their homes in hospitality. Paul listed his difficulties traveling thus: “I have been on frequent journeys, in dangers from rivers, dangers from robbers, dangers from my countrymen, dangers from the Gentiles, dangers in the city, dangers in the wilderness, dangers on the sea, dangers among false brethren; I have been in labor and hardship, through many sleepless nights, in hunger and thirst, often without food, in cold and exposure” (2Corinthians 11:26-27). Imagine how refreshing to a believing traveler, such as Paul, was finding a fellow Believer who opened up his or her home.
And many did. Lydia, Paul’s first convert in Philippi, opened her home for an extended stay. Gaius opened his home to Paul in Corinth and they held regular worship services there. The Philippian jailer immediately opened his house to Paul and Silas upon his conversion. In Thessalonica Paul and his companions probably stayed with Jason. Prisca and Aquila opened their home as a place for the church to gather. Titius Justus opened his home for Paul to lecture from in Corinth. Nympha, in Laodicea, and Philemon, in Colossae, opened their homes to the church for worship. Simon the tanner opened his home for Peter to stay and then gave the servants from Cornelius overnight lodging. Cornelius offered his home as lodging for Peter and his companions. Paul, immediately after his conversion, enjoyed the hospitality of the Believers in Damascus.
Christian hospitality gave believing travelers a place to stay in an environment of safety, Christian companionship, and respite from the darkness of the surrounding culture. It offered a place where Christ is named and glorified and where all can call upon the heavenly Father with one voice. The church practiced it from its beginning and continues to benefit from it today. It also gives a place to discuss the latest news about churches and Believers in other places. Today, we often do this with those we call missionaries, offering a safe place for Christian fellowship and the building up of godly relationships. Christian hospitality offers many strengthening benefits to the Church. This is why God calls the Church to:
“Be devoted to one another in brotherly love, … practicing hospitality.”
Lionel Casson, Travel in the Ancient World (Baltimore and London, 1994)
By Stephen Mitchell
Drs Gary Habermas and Mike Licona have written a book titled The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus. In that book they have listed for us four facts accepted by all reputable scholars, Christian and non-Christian. They added one more fact which almost all reputable scholars accept. These are:
1. Jesus died by crucifixion.
2. Jesus’ disciples believed that he rose and appeared to them.
3. The church persecutor Paul was suddenly changed.
4. The skeptic James, the brother of Jesus, was suddenly changed.
and the fifth:
5. The tomb was empty.
With these five facts one can reasonably defend the historicity of the Resurrection in encountering opposing theories. I will summarize some of their examples listed.
A legend theory: The story just grew and was embellished over time before they were put into writing.
How does one answer this? First, it was the Disciples themselves who told the story of the Resurrection. They showed their total belief in this by suffering and dieing for its truthfulness. Second, the persecutor Paul changed from a persecutor to one who taught, suffered and eventually died for its truthfulness by what, he wrote, was an encounter with the risen Jesus. Third, this can be applied to the skeptic James as well. Fourth, simply asserting that the story changed over time does not make it so. There must be evidence that this happened and there is none.
How about the claim that the Gospel stories of the Resurrection are just moral tales, not meant to be taken as history?
First, this claim cannot account for the empty tomb. Second, a fable or moral story would not have convinced the church persecutor Paul. Third, neither would they have convinced the skeptic James. Fourth, the way opponents responded shows that the early church understood the Resurrection to be an historical event. Fifth, the accounts themselves present the event as historical.
What about the claim of fraud: the Disciples stole the body or the witnesses went to the wrong tomb or maybe someone else stole the body?
First, the Disciples claimed to have seen and interacted with the risen Jesus. For this claim they willingly suffered and died. Second, a story about the Resurrection did not convince the persecutor Paul. He himself wrote that it took an encounter with the risen Lord to change him. Third, simply an empty tomb was not convincing by itself. Only the Disciple John was convinced by the empty tomb. The rest, according to the early records, were not convinced until they had seen and interacted with the risen Jesus. Fourth, the early records show that the location of the tomb was known and even the enemies of Jesus accepted that it was empty.
Habermas and Licona discuss many more objections, showing how the evidence supports the historicity of the Resurrection of Jesus. I would highly recommend this book for anyone who has questions about its truthfulness or who struggles to defend it against the critics and unbelievers. Just remember that, for anyone to take the final step of belief in Jesus, the witness of the Scriptures themselves need to be implemented by the work of the Holy Spirit in their hearts.
We need, as the apostle Peter wrote, to “sanctify Christ as Lord in [our] hearts, always being ready to make a defense to everyone who asks [us] to give an account for the hope that is in [us], yet with gentleness and reverence; and keep a good conscience so that in the thing in which [we] are slandered, those who revile [our] good behavior in Christ will be put to shame” (1Peter 3:15-16).
Gary R. Habermas and Michael R. Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2004)
By Stephen Mitchell
The fifth and final statement (see previous 3 posts) on the resurrection that almost all reputable scholars accept:
5. The empty tomb.
How do we know it was empty? There are three lines of evidence that Habermas and Licona present. These are: The Jerusalem factor, enemy attestation, and the testimony of women.
What is the Jerusalem Factor? It is the simple fact that Jerusalem is not only where Jesus was crucified and buried, it is also where His resurrection was first preached. Anyone could have simply walked outside the city to the tomb and verified it for themselves. Even though the public preaching did not come, as far as we know, until fifty days after His death, He still would have been recognizable. “First, in the arid climate of Jerusalem, a corpse’s hair, stature, and distinctive wounds would have been identifiable, even after fifty days. Second, regardless of the condition of his body, the enemies of Jesus would still have found benefit in producing the corpse. Even a barely recognizable corpse could have dissuaded some believers, possible weakening and ultimately toppling the entire movement. Since that was the goal, Jesus’ enemies had every reason to produce his body, regardless of its condition. It is true that, upon viewing the corpse, many Christians would have claimed that it was a hoax. Nevertheless, there still would have been a huge exodus of believers who would have lost confidence in Christianity upon seeing an occupied tomb and a decaying corpse” (Habermas and Licona, p. 70).
There is also the claim of Him being seen by more than five hundred during the first forty days following His death and resurrection. All any of them would have had to do is walk outside Jerusalem and look into His tomb. Since the persecutor Paul claimed that most of those were still alive and could be spoken to several years later, anyone could have checked on the story. With the evidence of so many today traveling to see the supposed empty tomb, I would imagine that very many of those during the first forty days did the same. The first century records make the claim that at least two of the men did so: Peter and John. It was a short run for those men to the tomb so anyone who could walk could go see for themselves.
What about the enemy attestation? “The empty tomb is attested not only by Christian sources. Jesus’ enemies admitted it as well, albeit indirectly. Hence, we are not employing an argument from silence. Rather than point to an occupied tomb, early critics accused Jesus’ disciples of stealing the body (Matt. 28:12-13)” (Habermas and Licona, p. 71).
The story was still being circulated more than a hundred years later. The Christian author, Justin Martyr, in his 2nd century writing Dialogue with Trypho, which is his record of a discussion he had with a Jewish man, noted “yet you not only have not repented, after you learned that He rose from the dead, but, as I said before, you have sent chosen and ordained men throughout all the world to proclaim that a godless and lawless heresy had sprung from one Jesus, a Galilæan deceiver, whom we crucified, but his disciples stole him by night from the tomb, where he was laid when unfastened from the cross, and now deceive men by asserting that he has risen from the dead and ascended to heaven” (Book 4, chapter 8, section 15).
The story that the Disciples stole Jesus’ body is an implicit admission that the tomb was empty.
What about the testimony of women? In all four first century Christian accounts of the resurrection, women were the first to the tomb and the first to give testimony that the tomb was empty. Why is this significant? In the first century Jewish culture, women were not considered reliable witnesses. Josephus, the first century Jewish historian, wrote, “But let not the testimony of women be admitted, on account of the levity and boldness of their sex, nor let servants be admitted to give testimony on account of the ignobility of their soul.” The Talmud also noted, “Any evidence which a woman [gives] is not valid.” Having women be the primary witness was a huge mistake for that culture, unless, of course, it was true. But women would be going to the tomb since, in that culture, the women prepared the bodies for burial and Jesus was taken down right at sunset so they would not have been able to finish their work on Jesus’ body. They would, in fact, have been the first to the tomb. In other words, the accounts have the mark of historical validity. One does not make up stories and have as their primary witnesses a group of people whose witness would not be accepted. And Luke recorded that the Disciples reacted according to their culture of disdaining the witness of women. “Now they were Mary Magdalene and Joanna and Mary the mother of James; also the other women with them were telling these things to the apostles. But these words appeared to them as nonsense, and they would not believe them” (Luke 24:10-11). Even the Romans had a similar view of women as witnessed by the early second century Roman historian Suetonius in his work, The Twelve Caesars.
So it certainly seems to be a reasonable conclusion that the tomb was empty.
In the last post in this series I will look at the way Habermas and Licona show us how these four facts plus one will work together to defend the historicity of the resurrection of Jesus.
Gary R. Habermas and Michael R. Licona, The Case for the Resurrection of Jesus (Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2004)
Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews
