Buildings from God

At the end of life, we will all go home, and it won’t be to a tiny house or a spacious mansion. Instead, it will be to a house that is eternal in heaven.

The apostle Paul was a skilled master builder.

In his first letter to the Corinthians, he said that he “laid a foundation” in the city of Corinth, and then someone else began to build on it (1 Corinthians 3:10). Paul believed that “each builder must choose with care how to build,” whether they use gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, or straw. But in any good Christian construction project, said Paul, the “foundation is Jesus Christ” (vv. 10-12).

In the city of Detroit, a development of tiny homes is being built on a Christian foundation. The developer is a group called Cass Community Social Services, which began during the Depression when Cass Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church opened a soup kitchen. In the 1950s, the church’s pastor expanded the congregation’s social services, creating an evening program, a free Bible class and a senior’s program.

Over the years, Cass began to work with people with developmental...