Jennifer Brandt interviews missionaries Natalie Widman and Lois Belch about the transformative power of Christian hospitality, sharing insights from decades of cross-cultural ministry in Tenerife, Spain and Venezuela. Discover cultural differences in welcoming others, practical tips for inclusive fellowship, and the role of food, faith, and discipleship in building authentic community.
Jennifer Brandt 0:01
Hi and welcome to the faith. Hospitality highlight. My name is Jennifer Brandt, and today I have the pleasure of interviewing two of our church's missionaries, Nathaniel Woodman and Lois Belch. A little background on them. Nathaniel has been going to faith since 1997 and was sent on a few short term teams to Kazakhstan, Pakistan, Venezuela and Tenerife, Spain. Now, this coming January, will mark 14 years of her living and serving full time in Tenerife. And then Lois and her husband Dave, started attending FBC when the Church was founded back in 1992 Lois was a missionary kid raised in Venezuela, and her and Dave were missionaries for a total of 42 years in Venezuela and later in Tenerife. I have so been looking forward to hearing a missionary's perspective on hospitality, and I'm excited to learn from your experiences. So thank you both so much for being here. First, I would like to have you guys introduce yourselves to the church and tell us about your ministries as missionaries and where you served and for how long and what you were doing in the places that God sent you.
Natalie Widman 1:15
I'm Natalie Widman and I have been in Kennedy face, Spain since 2012 helping out with a church plant there discipling high school girls and helping some of the older youth disciple the younger girls, and helping out with some of the ladies ministries and the kids club. Awesome. All right.
Jennifer Brandt 1:37
And Lois, what about you?
Lois Belch 1:38
My name is Lois belch, and I was raised in Venezuela with missionary parents, and then returned as a missionary. We met my my friend, and then became a husband in Venezuela. And for the first 20 years, we worked at an MK school, missionary children's school, and then from there, we went to church planting in Venezuela for 10 years, and our last 10 years of our 40 that we spent in missions was in Tenerife.
Jennifer Brandt 2:07
All right, first, I would like to know how you would define hospitality, and how have your experiences as missionaries shaped the way you understand hospitality. Natalie, I'll start with you.
Natalie Widman 2:21
I think of being Christ like so any way that you can show grace and generosity, bringing somebody in to your space and loving on them would be hospitality, any kind of welcoming, love and service where you can show them that they are in sacrificial way, that they are part of the body, that they're included in the love of Christ. So whether that looks like, you know, in your house with food or games, or maybe even in your car, you know, like having some, you know, having snacks or or hats or glasses, or just even just talking with somebody, showing them that they are cared for. Lois.
Lois Belch 3:12
What about you? Well, I actually looked it up, and I thought that what I read was really pretty good. It says extending warmth, kindness and generosity toward guests, visitors and even strangers, creating an environment that fosters genuine human connection and a sense of belonging. Obviously, as believers, it goes past that, and we share the love of Christ and we show the truth of Christ in an informal setting. So that's what I think.
Natalie Widman 3:44
Yeah, I think life is hard, and it's special to be able to show that to others like, Oh, we're all together in this walking in the grace of God together.
Jennifer Brandt 3:54
How does hospitality look different in Tenerife and Venezuela compared to the US.
Natalie Widman 4:04
Well, Americans are independent and efficient and punctual, and they make commitments that they usually hold to. They have a little organizers and Spanish and Latin culture, I would say, is people centered and we're all together, and doesn't matter what time it is,
Jennifer Brandt 4:27
just doing normal life things together all the time, right?
Lois Belch 4:31
I would agree, Venezuela was obviously the most laid back and because their motto, and there's a Spanish way of saying it is, if I have food for one, that means I have food for two. If I have food for two, that means I have food for three. They're always wanting to include another person or more people. But I think more important than the difference in hospitality, culturally. Is what God's Word says about hospitality, and I'm deviating a little bit from this, but I was looking at all the hospitality verses and and a lot of the actual hospitality scenarios in the Old and New Testament, and the difference that I found between what Scripture teaches and at least what North America teaches is scripture teaches spontaneous or fluid hospitality, whereas America is a controlled hospitality. I decide when the hour. I decide what kind of food, I decide who I'm going to bring in. I decide almost, there's almost a culture of you come, you spend between two and three hours and it's time to leave. It's very comfortable. And I'm not saying that that is bad, but I think true hospitality is spontaneous or prepared hospitality or readiness hospitality that, yes, there is room for the controlled hospitality, but what do we do with the unexpected that really tests where our heart is in terms of being willing to open our door, to share our home, to share a meal with people that we might not necessarily have invited in,
Jennifer Brandt 6:31
that's really good. It makes me think about times where I'm more hesitant, maybe than my husband is, to just like, spontaneously invite somebody over after church, like, Hey, do you want to come have lunch with us? Even if I don't necessarily have what I would think, in my mind, is enough for all of us, I'm sure it would still be enough, because we have such big portions in the US anyway. But it's a good reminder to be, I think, open and willing, because if I wasn't willing to do that, think about the opportunities that could be missed to encourage either another believer or even a non believer who's just attending church for a Sunday. You know, it's just to always kind of have your gospel outreach antenna on, I guess, and and also to accept when somebody else in our culture invites you over, that it's not like you're not hesitant, even in and of yourself, of like, oh, I wasn't planning to do that today and but that person could be blessed by you saying yes and going over.
Lois Belch 7:29
I remember one time in thinned e fit, we had a couple of families over for Thanksgiving, which they don't celebrate, but we thought we would open our home for them, and we couldn't get them to leave. It was probably 1130 at night, which is way past our bedtime, and we finally had to say, you know, I know that we've had a great time, but it's time to go, you know. But they had no reasoning, you know. They just didn't feel like they were having such a good time. They were obviously enjoying the warmth of fellowship, and it was with an interesting experience
Jennifer Brandt 8:05
for me. Has that been difficult for for you guys, going from the US kind of independent mentality to these places where maybe you do have to just be more willing and open? Has was that a challenge a
Natalie Widman 8:19
little bit you just would change your expectation a little bit, they might not show up on time. You don't know how I'm going to be here. Your job is to not complain.
Lois Belch 8:29
But it's fun. It's fun. My My experience was totally different because I was raised in Venezuela with parents that personified spontaneous hospitality. They had people always living in their home. Their door was always open. We always had extra people around the table, so that, as a matter of fact, I feel more intimidated with hospitality here in the US than I ever did in Venezuela or in anything. People are so structured if they're five minutes before or five minutes after, they're texting saying I'm so sorry I'm late. That is just not my background. I realize I have to adjust to this culture, so I can't even be I shouldn't be critical of it, but that is intimidating to me.
Jennifer Brandt 9:19
That's so different than I think most of our experiences, but I think that's really cool.
Lois Belch 9:24
Nathan and I have a mantra that we that we've said ever since we work together in in thin Editha, and that is that food has power, and so you invite people around a table with food, and there is something magical about that. It's very cool. They feel the warmth and kindness. Ideas flow. We're mutually lifted up. And I don't know. I just I don't know. What you would have to say
Natalie Widman 10:00
about that? I would say you and here in the US too, once you've been in someone's house, and then you see them again on, you know, Sunday morning, it's different. Like you like, Oh, I've been a part of your life, you know. I've seen your personal space. I've seen what you live like.
Jennifer Brandt 10:16
Have you had experiences like Lois was talking about in, more recently, in Tenerife with, like having people in your home, having meals together, and that kind of increasing just your familiarity and friendship with somebody.
Natalie Widman 10:32
It's it's good to create memories together, you know, and then play games together, laugh together, eat together.
Lois Belch 10:42
Yeah, I wrote down here, conversation flows. Ideas are shared, experiences are related. God's goodness is remembered, and people feel loved and heard when when you're around the table and and sharing, it's really quite amazing, whether it's here or whether it's in another country, and when you read the Bible, the hospitality instances almost always center around food, so that kind of brings down walls, like we all have to eat, you know? So that's, that's what I found. Yeah.
Jennifer Brandt 11:18
Nathan Lee in Tenerife, what has the outreach to the students looked like? Like the college students?
Natalie Widman 11:25
Well, they're they're not time sensitive. They want to be together. They want to share life together. So I think just a flexibility of when that's happening, because you can have some late nights where people just like, I want to talk. You can't look at the clock. You know you can. It's not important. A lot of times hospitality is in they need to go somewhere, and so it's in a car to spend that time together, or there's food, or you're going somewhere else for food. But on their on their time line, yeah,
Lois Belch 12:01
I remember one time David and I were asked to be premarital counseling for a couple that was getting married, obviously, and after a few times meeting with them, David and I realized, why don't we invite other couples that are thinking of getting married and newly married couples and invite them in our home once a month and see what happens. And it was amazing. Wouldn't you say Natalie was part of that? It was amazing what happened, because they were listening this new this couple that wanted to be married were listening to newly married couples interact and see the rawness and realness of marriage and the blessing of marriage through the eyes of newly married people. I mean, it was amazing.
Natalie Widman 12:51
You create opportunities. You guys did a great job of creating opportunities of discipleship and that Bible study, that group still meets now years later,
Lois Belch 13:01
it was a powerful thing. It really was. It was way, way better than David and I could have ever imagined it to be. It was a big undertaking, but it was oh so worth it. We would present a theme or or something to talk about so that there was a direction in the conversations, and that was helpful.
Natalie Widman 13:19
And again, with the power of food because of the same people like, well, I don't have time to do a study. No time to go there. Can you go over for food? Oh, yeah,
Jennifer Brandt 13:28
it changes everything that's good. So other than sharing meals with people, what are some other practical ways that you guys like to show hospitality?
Natalie Widman 13:41
I have a lot of car ministry I feel like just trying to show them like, what would encourage them to try to think ahead? What would encourage you to feel at home or comfortable in this situation?
Jennifer Brandt 13:54
What did your car ministry look like? What was some some other stories or examples of how that looked?
Natalie Widman 14:01
I don't know, I try to have this candy or snacks or gum or what youth would, you know, look for some glasses, some hats, anything that can like, oh, let's just change it. Like, breaks down a little bit of the uncomfortableness of a serious ride or something.
Jennifer Brandt 14:16
And it was just like getting them from point A to point B, just because they don't have a car, don't have a license,
Natalie Widman 14:21
right, right, okay, oh, they're younger, yeah, just to force a little bit of interaction between them in the car,
Lois Belch 14:28
I've been on the creative side of hospitality here in the US, I had a new friend that invited me and actually Natalie's mom on a picnic. And so we ended up, you know, having the food aspect, but we also were able to walk around a park. And that, I thought that was, that was really creative and fun, you know, because I don't know. And so I think, if we think beyond even our own house, like a barbecue. You, or let's meet in the park, or I know that there's lots of women with some small children, let's all meet in the park and during the summer, I think that's really that's really good. It's a way to meet other people and extend hospitality among those groups.
Jennifer Brandt 15:17
That it can happen anywhere. Exactly, got to be maybe more creative and right? Bring, just bring people into your life, right? No matter what you're doing, just invite people along. Be like I was gonna do this anyway, so I'll have other people tag along with me. Yeah, that's cool. How is God currently growing you in hospitality?
Lois Belch 15:36
Actually, he's growing me through my husband. He's, he's by far the most hospitable. He's always looking for opportunities to connect with people and invite people into our homes. I mean, we, we work with some immigrants here in town, and a year ago, one of them had a very serious accident with she fell, and she had a newborn, and her husband had to travel and there, and so they Ian, imagine being in a country where you don't know anyone, and you are so seriously physically impaired because her whole leg was in a castle. She couldn't handle her daughter and herself. They called us, even though it was inconvenient, there was no option. Obviously, God put that opportunity before us, and it was right before I was going to Italy for two weeks, like they left one day, I went to Italy the next day. So it wasn't convenient, but Genuine Hospitality, biblical hospitality, like what we find in Scripture. It's seldom convenient, and yet it was really impactful for us as well as for them. We were able to take that woman here to church. She listened to the entire Gospel. It was wonderful, but it wasn't something that I would choose. But David is always on the lookout. Let's have so and so over and okay, and I think we should do this okay, but he's the initiator that the Lord is using to grow me in hospitality. Because I have a whole list of reasons why I shouldn't, you know my reasons, and he just, you know, I haven't said those to him, but, yeah, there's all, all kinds of reasons why people say, No, it's not my gift. I'm sorry. It's a command. You know, doesn't matter your giftedness. You're supposed to be hospitable.
Jennifer Brandt 17:33
It kind of I think something I've learned is that hospitality and humility go hand in hand. It's not easy, and for some people especially, it's maybe just more challenging than another, than an extroverted person or somebody that just always wants to be around other people, but to just have the willingness and humility of heart to be like whatever God has for me. And I'm not going to hold on to my plans and what I want for me today, but be willing to serve other people and love them, even if it's a sacrifice. And that's what Christ did for us.
Lois Belch 18:07
And every time, with very few exceptions, through my life, when you extend yourself, you come away like, wow, it is just amazing. It is such a privilege to be you know, even when people come into our house, we think that we're serving them, and in the end, they serve us with their lives. It's really beautiful.
Natalie Widman 18:31
I love that. That's great. I would say what Lois said before, mentioned before the control like I'm an American and not gonna ever fully lose some of my culture. So to expect I'm not gonna have control of situation. My job is to love people and see the sovereignty of God in it, something that Lois says often is she likes to pray while she's baking the food. She makes amazing food. She has her own cookbook.
Jennifer Brandt 18:59
I didn't know that.
Lois Belch 19:04
I mean, is for the outreach ministry she put into a cook, and
Jennifer Brandt 19:10
she said
Natalie Widman 19:16
that she says a lot, she'll pray, but the food is good, so that people can enjoy it and be satisfied and eat what they want, but not so good that it becomes the conversation. So I think that's so wise. It's good to not think, Oh, I'm going to do this amazing food or this amazing dessert, and people are gonna be like, Wow, that's not my motive. I shouldn't, I shouldn't be with that motive so just remembering that I'm there to love people and be flexible, and
Jennifer Brandt 19:46
it's not to exalt ourselves, but to exalt God
Natalie Widman 19:51
that is very patient and kind with us.
Jennifer Brandt 19:55
Are there any people in your life? I know Lois is one of them you've already mentioned to. Lesson to me, somebody that you look up to, or you've learned a lot from in hospitality, whether there are other people that come to mind, yes, I
Natalie Widman 20:06
have a list. My mom has always been up for a game night, invite people over, create memories, just you know, however, the house is to reach out to people. She's always been like that. I had the blessing of also being kind of had like my Spokane. Years here at FBC, I was discipled by many ladies, but I would say like me, Martha Smith, Erica long and Amy de Berg were huge influences. I was in their house a lot, but I would also give like, I would say, heavily influenced some things that people that heavily influenced me were Pam Takasaki and Marilyn Clark, Lynn the Jarms and Kelly Ian. There's many, many more, but it's been a blessing because I it was gold to be able to see what they did and watch them interact with their families. And then once I got to Tenerife, I lived with Cheryl Albrecht, who was another mission. And it was over there for a few months I got to see firsthand some very solid, like inviting people over a very intentional hospitality. And then Lois influenced me in huge ways. She was always talking about, like, look at the salad. It's a happy salad. Look at the napkins we put on the plates. Like the table is set before the people come in and then and the napkins are happy. Everything's always happy with Louis, but really practical ways, when and then, when they retired, they gave me their giant table that seeds. How many? 16. So super practical ways every week I was over eating at the house. And then they left a few years ago, but moraima carespo is also that whole family this each week invited me into their house. So it's been a it's been a huge blessing, because these are people of integrity that were not afraid to share who they were.
Lois Belch 22:16
Nathaniel has people over almost every Sunday, to the tune of 20, and her apartment is American style from American standards, is not that big. No American would have 20 people in the size apartment that she has, but she does all the time. That's so cool, yep. And I think one of the things that that that they enjoy, the church and benedetha, is that she prepares for them, not lavishly, but when they come into their home, when into her home, they know that they are welcome. They are been waiting, waited for because of how she prepares the table. It makes it very welcoming.
Jennifer Brandt 23:06
You make it happy. Your table happy.
Natalie Widman 23:09
Something that we've been doing for a while is hiding, like things, or like changing one fork or hiding versus in napkins. And so the kids know, like there's going to be a little price, you can figure out which it is. So they're always like, where am I gonna sit?
Jennifer Brandt 23:23
That's pretty cute. Is it and Sunday norm that there's just a group of people coming over? Is it
Natalie Widman 23:30
becoming like, every Sunday? But many
Lois Belch 23:33
there's not as if there's something going on at the church, okay, something going on at the church. She, you know, she's intentional about getting through all of the congregation. It's quite amazing.
Natalie Widman 23:44
Oh, that's cool. Well, I need to grow in it more, but I have 21 chairs, and so I just try not to go over 21 that's when it makes it interesting. People invite themselves. You're like, Oh, someone's sitting on someone's
Jennifer Brandt 23:57
lap. Do you cook for everybody too? Yes.
Natalie Widman 24:00
Okay, sometimes people will offer, you know, like the dessert.
Lois Belch 24:04
Okay, I just want to say something about Nathan. When she first came to Kennedy thing, she was a zero in the kitchen. I do not, I do not mean to speak badly of her, but she did not know anything. And what amazes me about her is that she allowed God to teach her, and she was willing to learn that whole hospitality area. Ian, it's amazing what God has done through her, but she started not knowing very much about culinary, whereas I grew up cooking and shooting up, but I was just amazed. I'm thinking, wow, this is a balance to me
Natalie Widman 24:51
that's so sweet. Still have much to learn.
Jennifer Brandt 24:54
But just out of curiosity, what are some of kind of the go to meals and Tenerife that you make people.
Natalie Widman 25:00
Easy, something that you could cook ahead, that can sit in the oven and be ready when I get there, or in a crock pot. So is still like easy casseroles or lasagna or tacos or tacos, sometimes a soup or a chili, something that can already be ready.
Jennifer Brandt 25:19
Okay? And is it pretty similar to like, American cuisine, as far as like the style and the flavors, and I would say it's ingredients.
Natalie Widman 25:27
So if you agree with me, I would say it's more difficult to try a new recipe in January 5, because people will go, what is this? I've never seen this. Okay, yeah, yeah.
Lois Belch 25:36
They're not foodies like people here.
Jennifer Brandt 25:38
Oh, okay. They just want what they're used to. Okay, are there any other things that you guys wrote down that were kind of related to any of the questions that you want to talk well, one
Lois Belch 25:50
of the things that I like is, is to address why people don't. I mean, in my world, I'll say, Well, I have to clean my house. And have to, like, clean my house or No, maybe the guests will have allergies, and what a man do, or I don't want to be bothered. What do I talk about? If you're an introvert, you think, Oh, my goodness, I'm gonna have people, and I don't know what to talk about. And I'm not a cook. Listen, I've been here in America where I've gone to people's houses. They're not cooks, and they and they serve a meal, even if it's Costco, meatballs or whatever it is, okay, it is perfectly fine if you're not a cook, to figure out how you can still invite people into your home, because we don't have an option. We need to do it, and we need to do it with not thinking. Scripture is clear about this too. We don't do it so that they reciprocate. We do it. We're not supposed to do it for that reason. We're supposed to do it because we love them and we want to extend warmth and generosity to them, but not because we want to. We want it reciprocated.
Natalie Widman 27:02
I think Lois is a good example too, of not being so extravagant that someone else couldn't repeat it, because that's part of hospitality is you're encouraging, like, look, you can come into my house and then you can do this with other people, but if it's too extravagant, they're gonna be like, what? I can't do this, right?
Lois Belch 27:19
And I certainly don't want to invite other I can't do that. Mm, that. There's a balance there.
Jennifer Brandt 27:25
Yeah, you don't want to be come across intimidating, exactly. Yeah, yeah. I definitely oftentimes will. I think my first thought if Corey invites somebody over is, like, Is the house clean enough? Just things like that, and it's like, of course it is. It's not, I mean, it's not ever going to be perfect, but that shouldn't be a barrier either. I really appreciate that you guys did this interview, but also just kind of talked about the hesitations that I think are common to man, common to our hearts, that lead us more inward, rather than outward focused, loving the people around us. And I think that that's a really valuable lesson for the church to learn, for all of us to learn, to to look outside of ourselves and be willing and humble and ready, ready at all times, and not just yeah, in our American mindset of when it's convenient for me, but that it's always convenient to be hospitable, because it's a commandment and we want to obey the Lord. So thank you guys, thank you so much.
Natalie Widman 28:29
Thanks for having us. Jennifer all, thank you so much.
Jennifer is the Hospitality Highlight editor for Living Faith magazine. She and her husband Cory have been married since 2018 and serve together in Youth Ministry.
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