Barefoot?
Our Name
Barefoot Christian Church is a church community located in Lansing, MI. The name comes from Exodus 3:5 where Moses stands barefoot before the presence of God at the burning bush, on holy ground. To live barefoot is to recognize that because of Christ (John 4, Romans 12), being the church is not a once a week experience but is a life lived out in constant worship before God, barefoot in his presence.
Timeline
Our Community Groups were started in February ‘06 and continue to be the backbone of this church. On September 30, 2006, we launched a Saturday night worship gathering at Liberty Christian Church’s building. We moved to our own building (2312 E. Michigan Ave.) on April 13th, 2008 and began renovating the building (see pictures). We launched our Sunday morning worship gatherings on June 8th, 2008.
Be the Church
At Barefoot, we are not about “going to church”, rather we are all about being the church. Too often, church becomes very similar to a movie theater experience…you walk into a big room with a lot of people you don’t know very well, you watch a good show, then you leave, all the while pretending like everything is perfect in your life.
At Barefoot we have a weekly worship gathering where there is preaching and praising God collectively. We understand though that this large group gathering is not church, but is rather a piece of what church is. When we look at Acts 2:42-47, we see that the early church experienced six elements of church: teaching, socializing, eating, praying, caring for needs, and praising God. Praising God and teaching were only 1/3 of what the church did. At Barefoot, we desire to use our times of collective worship on Sunday mornings as a way of inspiring us to be the church throughout the week, as well a place to connect together to form deeper levels of church in our Community Groups. It is through our Community Groups that we can go out together and be the church to this world through serving and showing people Jesus’ unconditional love on a face to face basis.
Core Values
Following Christ
We aim to be a community where each individual is so in love with Jesus Christ that this love transforms every aspect of the individual’s life and priorities. We seek to become more like Christ through the way we follow him as Christians (literally “little-Christs”).
Knowing God
We seek to know God more personally through prayer and personal study of the Bible, as well as interaction with Scripture in community.
Worshiping God
We aim for our worship gatherings to be a collective expression of the way that we worship God all throughout our week. We seek to worship God “in spirit and in truth” (John 4:24). We aim to be the church, living lives of worship, rather than merely going to church as a ritual and giving God worshipful lip service.
Communicating Truth
We seek to communicate the truth of God’s Word and the abundant life that He brings to a culture that has ignored God and sought after instant gratification as its ultimate fulfillment. We will put this message into today’s language without compromising the Words of God. We seek to be relevant to our culture and to create space for people to explore and meet God.
Connecting Together
We aim to live lives of authentic community as the early church did in Acts 2. We aim to be in community groups where people can come and eat, pray, and care for each other as we walk this journey of faith together.
Loving Others
As Jesus says in John 13:34-35, we aim to love others unconditionally just as Jesus has loved us. We will do this intentionally by building relationships with our neighbors, co-workers, and all people God has put in our lives. Our agenda is not to convert or conquer these people, but to show them the unconditional love of Jesus and to let that love open doors for them to embrace Jesus.
Caring Like Jesus, as First Priority
We aim to care about the things that Jesus cares about, both locally and globally. This will be our first priority in where we invest our time and our money. We will be generous towards the forgotten and will put the needs of the poor and broken above the needs of ourselves as an organized church. We want to impact the Greater Lansing community and the global community with the tangible love of Jesus Christ.
Statement of Belief
We believe…
- the Bible is the Word of God, fully inspired and without error in the original manuscripts, written under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and that it has supreme authority in all matters of faith and conduct.
- there is one true and living God, existing in three co-equal and co-eternal persons, who has created all things out of nothing, and continues to sustain, provide, and rule all things to accomplish his purposes.
- that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, who added full humanity to His perfect deity, was born of a virgin, obeyed God perfectly, died for the sins of humanity, arose to life from death, and ascended to the Father.
- that the Holy Spirit came from the Father and Son to complete and perfect in us all the works Jesus began, convict of sin, form Christ-like character, and gift us for ministry.
- that people are created in God’s image, became sinners by choice, are alienated from God, possess no ability to restore themselves to right relationship with God apart from the finished work of Jesus Christ who calls, regenerates, justifies, adopts, and makes righteous.
- the Church, universally and locally, is a new people of God in which Christ has ultimate authority, is called together as Christ’s followers to share the truth and love of Jesus with the world, and has been granted two practices (baptism & the Lord’s Supper) to celebrate God’s work.
- that Jesus will personally and visibly return, establish His Kingdom, bodily resurrect all people for final judgment leading to eternal joy in God’s presence or eternal suffering apart from Him.