Book Review: The Gospel Comes with a House Key by Rosaria Butterfield.
by Bethany-Jane Christian
This article was first published in Dwell Issue 1 Spring 2020.
I received this book as an Easter present. Some people would prefer an Easter egg from Montezuma’s, but for me, this book revitalised my attitudes and practices when it came to community and hospitality both in the church and the home. For context, at the time I was working part-time as a hospitality intern for my church, Christ Church Spitalfields. I was also living in a community house with church staff, interns and members. We shared meals, and I even shared my room. So, as you have hopefully gathered, this book was a must-read for me.
The Gospel Comes with a House Key, confirmed to me all the things that I thought made community and hospitality completely vital to church and Christians. As Butterfield points out, a cup of coffee is a way of connecting to our non-Christian neighbours with something that is familiar and an easy offer. It is not like ramming our faith and theology down their throats, it’s only a cup of coffee. At my church, we offer chocolates outside of church before our 5pm service to passers-by. It’s so much easier to offer a chocolate than try and stand there offering some theology because chocolate is familiar. The offer of a chocolate leads to the offer of friendship, and then alpha, church, and a midweek group. The free refreshments before and after services often result in a newcomer or non-Christian who has been invited in to church being in shock at free food and drink. This is how we bond, this is how we create a platform for people to encounter Jesus, and be radically changed by his grace. Butterfield puts this so well herself with the phrase, “Radically Ordinary Hospitality.”
What is meant by radically ordinary hospitality? Butterfield defines it as, “using your Christian home in a daily way that seeks to make strangers neighbours, and neighbours family of God…," (note we don't stop at making them friends, we make them family), "....It brings glory to God, serves others, and lives out the gospel in word and deed. If you are prohibited from using your living space in this way, it counts if you support in some way in some household in your church that is doing that…” I’d like to interrupt here and say this works so well in practice. We have around 14 people for dinner every Sunday night after church. There are people who don’t live in my house but who we know we can count on to help lay the table, cut up bread, load the dishwasher, and make tea, without even being asked. They are practising radically ordinary hospitality but from our home. It means that our home can offer this hospitality without it falling all on us, and means it is sustainable. Butterfield’s definition continues, “...The purpose of radically ordinary hospitality is to build, focus, deepen, and strengthen the family of God, pointing others to the Bible-believing local church, and being earthly and spiritual good to everyone we know."
I love the way Butterfield links everything to the Bible and presents a mix of theology and testimony throughout the book. The stories she shares are powerful and show practically how radically ordinary hospitality works. It gives Butterfield credibility as you know she practises what she preaches, and can see the trials and lessons she has learnt. Besides, as a performer, I’m a firm believer in the power of storytelling to inspire, grow and motivate us!
Butterfield makes it clear that hospitality and community is not a nice idea for the church to try, but it is imperative if we want to emulate Christ and have a ministry modelled on his ministry. It goes way beyond what we may first assume, and I hope that this review may encourage you all just a bit more about the importance of community and hospitality.
So firstly, the theology. Jesus used hospitality and community as a major part of his ministry. He fed the 5000, went around Zaccheaus’s house for tea, and hung out with the extreme ends of society over food and drink - the Pharisees and the tax collectors, prostitutes, and outcasts. In the chapter of the book called, “The Jesus Paradox,” the author hones in on Luke 5, when Jesus heals a man with leprosy, and shows, what Butterfield terms, “contagious grace.” Jesus did not shy away from touching the leper, a man who had not been touched since he caught leprosy. Butterfield writes Jesus didn’t talk to the man, tell him God loved him, and hark on about how leprosy was a social construct rooted only in the eyes of the beholder. Jesus wasn’t afraid to touch hurting people. He, “drew people in close. He met them empty and left them full. Jesus turned everything upside down.” God restored us through grace and then gave us a family - the church - to practise contagious grace within.
So what does this look like? It looks like an open home, a transparent life, where Christians and non-Christians alike see us, including our struggles with sin, and see us as we live out contagious grace. And we do this through radically ordinary hospitality. What does this require? Butterfield says, “We must be teachable. We have no business calling our neighbours to live differently if we don’t.” “We must work hard to know who our neighbours are and how they struggle.” Learn to love the sinner and hate the sin. Through radically ordinary hospitality, “we gather people in close, we feed and clothe the poor, we accept people where they are, we care for the needs of the body, and we seek to restore the dignity of each human being.” But Christian hospitality also, “views struggling people as image bearers of a holy God, needing faith in Christ alone, belief in Jesus the rescuer of his people, repentance of sin, and covenant family within the church.” In other words, that is the radical part to accompany our ordinary cup of coffee or bowl of bolognese.
What stood out to me as making hospitality so powerful was that it literally:
Removes isolation and loneliness. In 2019, there were 8.2 million people living alone in the UK having increased by a fifth in the last 20 years (Office for National Statistics).
Stops people practising sin. Butterfield writes that if someone is invited around your house for dinner, they are in a supportive community in which they are less likely to sin and get the help they need to break bad habits.
Gives purpose. Someone knows that every Sunday evening you need them to lay the table for dinner. That is their role and they are needed.
Grows the church. People are brought into the church family.
Creates a safe space for asking the difficult questions of life. A home is a safe space.
So how can we do this? One thing that Butterfield is emphatic about is the simplicity of her meals. Each day she makes something simple like a big pot of bean stew and a big pan of rice. Make it easy. We always cook lentil dahl and rice every Sunday. Nobody minds, it is a sustainable way of practising hospitality. By all means, cook a fancy dinner every now and then as a treat, if you like, and all dress up in black tie (we did at Christmas!) but above all make your hospitality offer sustainable with your life's other demands. We even use pureed garlic and ginger paste in our dahl to save on crushing fresh garlic and grating fresh ginger from scratch. Buy from Lidl instead of Waitrose. Accept help, and encourage people to bring along a side dish or drinks. Our house has 11 people in it, and our hospitality could not be done by one person. Butterfield is also a stay-at-home mum. My household’s hospitality will never reach the heights of Butterfield’s, because we all have jobs or degrees to study for. But that’s okay, as we must each do what God has called us to do.
So I encourage you, to read this book. Imagine an East London where everyone has the offer of dinner in a community setting, and knows their neighbour. As Butterfield says, “start somewhere, start today." Let's end loneliness and isolation. Let's replicate the early church and Jesus's ministry of community and hospitality. Let's grow God's kingdom.
All quotes from:
Butterfield, Rosaria Champagne. The Gospel Comes with a House Key: Practicing Radically Ordinary Hospitality in Our Post-Christian World. (Crossway, 2018)
This article was first published in Dwell Issue 1 Spring 2020.