When Brandon and Jen Hatmaker agreed to take in a Spanish-speaking family in the aftermath of a hurricane, and 82 members of the “family” showed up, it was the best thing that ever happened to their new church, according to Brandon in his book Barefoot Church: Serving the Least in a Consumer Culture. People from the church and community called to offer their help, and the next Sunday’s worship gathering was the most intuitively worshipful gathering they had ever had.
The book tells a number of stories and provides a powerful challenge for churches to get involved in serving neighbours and the poor. The “barefoot church” theme is derived from a cold Easter day service at which attendees were invited to donate their good quality shoes to the homeless, and go home with bare feet. The author’s church, Austin New Church (ANC), has Sunday services like any other church, but it is organised primarily around serving others rather than around the Sunday services.
Rather than having church staff organise all the serving opportunities, ANC turned its community groups into “Restore Communities”, committed to individual, collective and social renewal, each with hosts, facilitators (Bible study leaders), and restore leaders. The restore leaders are responsible for ensuring that two of the community gatherings each month are spent loving their neighbour or serving their city. Through the Restore Communities, ANC provides a pool of volunteers to help the work of numerous different non-profit organisations in the city.
In my view the book points to an antidote for the current malaise of the church in the West. At a time when Christians behave just like everybody else and churches have very little resemblance to the vibrant, attractive communities of faith envisaged in the New Testament, the author’s call for a significant change to the actions and priorities of churches is compelling. This is not about abandoning evangelism in favour of social action; it is about living the gospel message more fully and being more faithful disciples of Jesus.