Welcome to You

Transcript

Once again welcome with great respect, with great love, I welcome you with all my heart.

Welcome is a beautiful word. I like the word “welcome”.

I remember once I invited somebody to come to my house, my friend Claudia. She got to the threshold of the house and she stopped.

I was like “This is a bit odd. Claudia, are you a vampire?”

She said “No, I just want you to welcome me. I want you to say it explicitly that I can come in.

And I thought it a bit funny at the time, maybe a bit superstitious. When I reflected on that I thought “That makes a lot of sense”. There’s a kind of spiritual message there.

Who really wants to enter someone’s house when they’re not welcome? If they don’t want you there, it’s going to cause a lot of tension. Maybe some bad vibes or some other spiritual stuff. Some kind of negative energy.

Have you ever been in somebody’s house and you get the feeling you’re not really welcome there? That you’re not really wanted there?

And you started to get that idea and maybe you felt a little tense in your stomach. At the same time you’re not sure if you should go or if you should leave. Maybe it’s all in your head.

It’s not really a pleasant experience.

On the other hand, what about when someone makes you certain that you are welcome?

They say, “Come in. Take a seat. Take the best seat in the house.”

I remember when my friend Inna and her husband Lyubo invited me to their house to stay.

They said “You can take the bedroom and we will sleep on the couch. Cause you are our guest.

I said “Inna that’s not really necessary I can sleep on the couch fine.”

They said “No this is our tradition in Bulgaria. This is the hospitality we want to offer you”.

They were so kind and they would make a huge breakfast. Lyubo fried up like a whole dozen eggs for breakfast. I had absolutely no doubts that they wanted me there and that they enjoyed my company. I was so grateful.

When I was in a bus accident outside of Mexico City. I’ve told this story before near Temixco and near Cuernavaca. I got to Mexico City and I said to my friend Helinka “Do you think I could stay at your place?”

And she said “Yes, of course”. And she welcomed me in and took me to the pharmacy to buy more gauze and bandages and helped me with the bandages. I never doubted for a second that I was welcome there and later she was driving me to the bus station or whatever it was and I said “Thank you Helinka for doing this.”

And she played it off saying “It’s nothing. De nada”

I said “Helinka that wasn’t nothing. What you did was amazing.”

It’s really nice to know you’re welcome somewhere. Maybe you’re fortunate enough that you can return to your home town and find your parents there and have a home to go to. Not everyone in this world has a place that they can go back to.

If you have a place like that, it’s really special. It’s a blessing. Bless those homes that welcome those wayward strangers, wayward travelers. Those folks who don’t know exactly where they are going, but for tonight they have a place. A warm hearth and a warm bed and maybe some warm hot chocolate.

Thank you so much for listening. Thank you for showing hospitality cause that’s one of the most special things you can do for a person to let them know they’re at home in this world.