Behind The Porchlight: Live from The Living Room

There are myriad ways to practice hospitality. The Porchlight network is full of folks opening up their living spaces to live music, but many open up their businesses and churches as well. So while most house concerts tend to happen in living rooms, the recent one with Andy Zipf happened in the Living Room.

Jim Poorman, pastor at H20 Church Orlando (which hosts the Living Room), first learned about the Porchlight network from a man in his church. From then on, things clicked into gear. With previous experience in hosting, Jim knew what to expect when the night came, and hosting Andy Zipf only served to reinforce his perspective.

Behind The Porchlight: Havenwood Hosts Embrace Creativity

Jason and Cary Brege’s home sits nestled in a regular neighborhood in Raleigh, North Carolina. Though their home faces the suburbs, the party’s often in the back—on the homemade stage, that is.

Welcome to Havenwood, a quarter-acre property backing up to a 27-acre lake, all teeming with wildlife. This place exudes and embraces the uniqueness of creativity. The Brege’s stage, a detached deck they built as one of a few projects during the early months of COVID-19, foregrounds this view. Guests to shows at the Brege home also enjoy access to a fridge full of Dr. Pepper in glass bottles (a signature feature of Havenwood) and have the opportunity to get their game on with artists at the post-show kitchen table ping-pong game. But the real VIP-access, Cary tells me, is in the treehouse that overlooks the scene, perfect for the kids. 

Behind The Porchlight: The Art of Hospitality w/ Austin Smith

There’s a method to the madness of opening up one’s home for live music. For some, this may look like choosing lights that lend a certain ambiance to the room. Others might invite a friend with a similar music vibe to open for the visiting artist. All of this exhibits your particular art of hospitality—as significant as the art it frames and sustains.

Whatever elements we decide, the choices we make in that process inevitably spring from a root of belief, of meaning. Orthopraxy follows orthodoxy. In other words, our faith feeds all of our work. 

So what does it mean to have a theology of hospitality? Where can it take us? We caught up with Porchlight host Austin Smith from Washington D.C. the other day to pick his brain on the matter.

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