Being the Sermon: Rebuilding a Home, One Gospel Conversation at a Time

Alex spent three years building his home from nothing. Seven days after the work was finished, Hurricane Lane hit. An 18-foot wall of water came down the river and grounded everything on his farm, eventually rising 38 vertical feet. In a matter of hours, everything he owned was gone, and he was left roughly $370,000 in debt.

“I have not had a decent night’s sleep since this flood,” he says.

This summer, our Brentwood Baptist Disaster Relief Team joined the Arise and Build program through the Tennessee Baptist Mission Board to build Alex a new home. The building is real, hands-on work, but it’s also the doorway to something deeper. We come to build homes so we can have gospel conversations with homeowners, neighbors, and the people we meet along the way. The hammer and the nails are how we come alongside someone physically and then meet the spiritual need they’re feeling.

For Alex, the difference has been hard to put into words. Walking through the house and knowing he’ll have a warm place for himself and his boys is a lot to take in. “I’ve spent all week with these guys, and it charges your batteries. It charges your soul,” he says. “To watch a group of guys come out that don’t know me from Adam and help us, it’s hard to not have faith. I know it is God reaching out and showing up.”

That’s the heart of disaster relief. As one of our team members put it, “It’s one thing to preach a sermon. It’s another thing to be a sermon.” Watching the team work for Alex was like watching the best sermon you’ve ever seen.