The past few months have been among the most exciting in the life of our church so far. We have been deep into the process of figuring out whether God would have us take advantage of the opportunity at 2301 Concord Road, and we are finally coming to the end of the journey.
Landmarks
Here are just a few of the landmarks we’ve passed on the way:
- We identified at our vision dinner that it was time for our church to make a move to a larger facility to allow us to continue to grow.
- We launched our campaign, Everyone Needs a Home, with the idea that we wanted to raise $550,000 over three years so that we would be in position to buy or build a $3M permanent home for our church that would be a spiritual home for the spiritually homeless in our county.
- We received pledges that to date amount to about $136,000, falling apparently far short of our goal, and leading us to conclude that God wanted us to reconsider our $3M building plans.
- Pastor Billy found out about the building at 2301 Concord Road that after negotiations could be purchased for only $400,000 leading us to realize we could own our own space, improve our ministry programming, and reach an underserved area of Lafayette all for less money than we are paying on our current lease.
- We recognized the potential difficulty of moving our church operations to a building next door to an adult book store and night club, held town hall discussions, and received online feedback, but the overwhelming majority of people in our congregation responded with vision and enthusiasm for how this move would help us live out our mission of helping people discover life in Christ.
- We entered into negotiations with a lender (Cornerstone Fund), an architect, and contractors to determine the financial feasibility of the move.
- We discovered that getting the building ready for the ministry we would want to do would cost an additional $200,000, and that there were limits to how much we could borrow.
- So finally, we spent every Saturday evening in prayer at the building, asking God for wisdom and clarity, recognizing all along that the odds were all stacked against us and if He wanted us there, he would have to open the doors.
So now, here we are, September 12, four months after Billy, Beth, Jen and I first visited the building and the elders started talking about it, and at every turn, God has continued to open the doors, and our Realtor has set up a tentative closing date of September 25!
There is only one thing left in the process before we would be able to close. Our lender needs to determine the final value of the building after our buildout is complete and then how much they will be able to lend us, but here’s the kicker… our lender has already made the commitment to us that they will make sure we have all the money we need by opening a new financing door we didn’t even know existed!
In other words, even though the lender still needs to make a final decision about how much money they can lend, and even though there may still be a need to renegotiate the purchase price of the building, we have basically been assured that there are no more closed doors.
Writing those words kinda makes me nervous.
Nerves
Back when we first moved to town, I would tell everyone I met that I was getting a new church started here, and every one of them came back at me with the same question: “Where are you building?” At the time, I was opposed to buildings out of principle. In my naive idealism, I kept thinking that the church is more than the building. I kept trying to promote “people over programs” and other ministry platitudes like that. However, over time, I came to realize that the stability of the church home base determines the effectiveness of that church in doing its mission (at least here in America).
Then, prompted by a good friend of mine, Reggie Alderman, who is now the counseling pastor at Calvary Baptist in West Lafayette, we determined to sign a lease for our current location at Braddock Drive. I still remember the day I signed that document. I was scared. Here I was with the future of the church on the line as I signed a document claiming we would pay Alan a set amount of money every month over three years! Making that commitment was a real step of faith on my part.
And God blessed it.
Over the past five years of our time at 3667 Braddock, God has empowered us to grow into our mission of helping people find life in Christ. We are regularly seeing people come into our fellowship to discover the life God designed for them. Our leadership is stronger and more stable than it has ever been, and I’m so grateful for the prompting given to me by Pastor Reggie to take this leap of faith.
Now, I’m about to do it all over again.
But the truth about faith is that every act of faith is a new act of faith. This opportunity, brought to me initially by my good friend Billy Hardy, is challenging me to think about my faith in God all over again. If I sign the document at the end of this month, I will be making a promise to a lender that we will give them a set amount of money every month for years to come, and though I’m nervous about the finances, I’m more nervous about our ministry.
Now, don’t get me wrong. For the most part, I am totally stoked about this opportunity. I know the financing won’t really be a problem. I have seen Billy apply exceptional skill and tenacity to the details of construction planning, so I have no doubt that he can lead us well to make the buildout happen. Furthermore, I have spoken to many people in our church who are excited about the potential of us becoming the church next to a strip club, going right next door to where some of Lafayette’s neediest and most broken people are going weekly to help them too discover life in Christ. All those things contribute to making me feel really excited about this opportunity for us as a church, and I am more convinced than ever that God is leading us into this move.
Nevertheless, I have also spoken to people in our church who are broken and wounded themselves over the kind of businesses that we’d be moving right next to. They have experienced abuse or temptation in their past and the thought of being reminded of that past every time they come to church is just so painful that they aren’t interested in making this move.
That saddens me and makes me nervous not because I’m worried we will lose people (people leave churches all the time, and pastors have to simply have a thick skin about it sometimes) but because I’m worried that our future location might prevent some people from discovering the life of freedom and healing that comes through Jesus.
I’m convinced that whatever is in your past, Jesus can heal it. I’m convinced that whatever temptation you face, Jesus can bring you victory. And I’m convinced that both the healing and the victory comes in the context of solid Christian community.
Call to Action
So, I’m calling all of you to action. If you consider LCC your church home or if you don’t doesn’t matter much to me. I want you to join me in as many of these things as you possibly can.
- Pray with me. Of course, you can pray in the privacy of your own home, but I’m asking you to join me this evening at 5pm at 2301 Concord Road to pray for God’s wisdom and guidance, and to pray for healing and victory for all who have been wounded by the sex industry in our world.
- Love each other well. I’m not going to tell you who in our church has expressed issues with this move because that would be breaking confidence, but it also doesn’t matter. I don’t want you to love people because you sense they are more needy than others. I want you to be loving to everyone. So here’s the deal: tomorrow, when you come to our worship gathering, I want you to find someone you haven’t shown love to yet, and go up to them, introduce yourself to them, and have just enough of a conversation with them to help them feel a little more love from their Heavenly Father and their spiritual family.
- Give me your honest feedback. We have established a confidential, online system for you to submit feedback to the elders of the church without disclosing your name. Click this link to Submit Your Feedback.
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