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Jesus was a tektôn, or craftsman, by trade (Mk 6:3), someone who built things with wood, brick and stone. We do not know what types of physical structures he worked on with his father, Joseph, but we can speak of his spiritual legacy as the one who built the house of God. The master builder constructs the church.

We understand the artisan, the craftsman, the musician through the artifacts they leave behind. Surely it behooves us to think about the new Temple, crafted by Jesus for the family that dwells in the house of God. The First Letter of Peter tells us that Jesus himself is not just the builder, but the “cornerstone” of the new Temple. The members of God’s family are “like living stones,” who must let themselves “be built into a spiritual house.” The manner in which each stone of the church is shaped and formed is through the ongoing work of holiness.

And within the house built by Christ, we are co-contractors with the master builder in this ongoing project. Families grow and expand and so, too, must the house in which they live. This might require additional rooms, or it might require changes and development in relationships. Such work was needed even in the earliest church, as the Acts of the Apostles reports. Among the first members of the church, some Greek-speaking Jewish disciples (the Hellenists) were upset with the Hebrew-speaking Jewish disciples (the Hebrews), claiming that the widows of the Hellenists were being ignored in the daily distribution of food. The Twelve met with the Hellenists, and the apostles acknowledged that the complaints of the Hellenists had merit. The house needed to be put in order.

The family of God behaves like most families, and at the heart of family life is the sharing of meals that are at once material and spiritual. The table, the source of familial comfort and belonging, can also be the focal point of tension and rancor. Since the apostles needed to devote themselves to the word of God and not to service at table, they chose seven Hellenists to care for the distribution of the food to the growing church.

This account has traditionally been seen as the origin of the order of deacons, but even though the origin of the diaconate is certainly more complex historically, we have in this passage a genuine view of the house of God expanding in structure and in diversity to meet the needs of the growing family of faith. This new work was essential to serve the burgeoning church.

The church here on earth, founded on the cornerstone that is Jesus Christ, built with and by the “living stones” of those who make up the house of God, is always growing to meet the physical and spiritual needs of the family of God. The church is a house full of the wounded and the suffering, but it is also a place of joy. Yes, we bear our scars, just as our master builder does, in a home always under renovation, but this is a big house, in which all are welcome and called to the table.

Whatever our earthly flaws, we are working for the promise of the perfect home in God’s kingdom. It might seem too literal to concretize the spiritual and heavenly realm with the example of a building, but it is Jesus who speaks of the father’s oikia or “house” with “many dwelling places.” The image of a house is perfect because whether our families have lived together harmoniously or in various states of dysfunction, even of abuse, we all can imagine the perfect home. It is this home that speaks of the family of God at peace. The wood, bricks and mortar are concrete images that plumb the depths of our longing for a family home where all are welcome and safe.

We know our own building efforts are faulty and imperfect, but each of us builds with and is being built by the master builder as a member of this household of faith. As we build, we are also being shaped into “living stones” being made perfect for our eternal home. What has Christ the master builder built and what is he building? All of us, brick by brick, stone by living stone, are being shaped and formed to live forever in the house of God.

This article appears in May 12 2014.

John W. Martens is an associate professor of theology at the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minn,where he teaches early Christianity and Judaism. He also directs the Master of Arts in Theology program at the St. Paul Seminary School of Divinity. He was born in Vancouver, B.C. into a Mennonite family that had decided to confront modernity in an urban setting. His post-secondary education began at Tabor College, Hillsboro, Kansas, came to an abrupt stop, then started again at Vancouver Community College, where his interest in Judaism and Christianity in the earliest centuries emerged. He then studied at St. Michael's College, University of Toronto, and McMaster University, with stops at University of Haifa and University of Tubingen. His writing often explores the intersection of Jewish, Christian and Greco-Roman culture and belief, such as in "let the little children come to me: Children and Childhood in Early Christianity" (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 2009), but he is not beyond jumping into the intersection of modernity and ancient religion, as in "The End of the World: The Apocalyptic Imagination in Film and Television" (Winnipeg: J. Gordon Shillingford Press, 2003). He blogs at  www.biblejunkies.com and at www.americamagazine.org for "The Good Word." You can follow him on Twitter @biblejunkies, where he would be excited to welcome you to his random and obscure interests, which range from the Vancouver Canucks and Minnesota Timberwolves, to his dog, and 70s punk, pop and rock. When he can, he brings students to Greece, Turkey and Rome to explore the artifacts and landscape of the ancient world. He lives in St. Paul with his wife and has two sons. He is certain that the world will not end until the Vancouver Canucks have won the Stanley Cup, as evidence has emerged from the Revelation of John, 1 Enoch, 2 Baruch, and 4 Ezra which all point in this direction.