2 Samuel 1-2, Luke 14:1-24 • Key Verses: Luke 14:13-14
We always like to get something back from our investments. Money we put in the stock market
is done so with the hope of gain. A gift sent to a client is given with the hope of gaining more
business. Even a favor for a friend might be done with an eye on a future time when the favor
will be returned. The unspoken mantra is, “What’s in it for me?”
In the margin of my Bible next to verse 14 is written, “disinterested goodness.” This verse
exhorts us to invest with no hope of return, to do good without an eye on the immediate future.
Jesus tells us to show hospitality to those who cannot return the favor, an act of goodness but a
disinterested one. It is “disinterested” in the sense that it is not deposited with hopes of gaining
something in return, like interest.
Is it really hospitality when we invite someone to our home in hopes of what we might gain from
the time? Perhaps as we define hospitality it is, but it will not meet the standard of what Jesus set
before us. He instructs us to reach out to the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind (v. 13). God
will reward us in eternity.
Until then, we should do unto others not because of what they may be able to do unto us, But
simply because we should.
Think of something you can do today for someone who cannot repay— and do it.

Woodrow Kroll & Tony Beckett
www.backtothebible.in