Its actually pretty amazing, I’ve been around church buildings all my life, always in and around when no one else is ever there... which is pretty close to any time other than Sundays and Wednesday nights.
I’d say they’re onto something here. This building is used for... I don’t know how many random things.
I’ve thought for a long time that church buildings were mostly the biggest waste of space. And I still believe that if you are starting a church; do it without a building.
But the truth is there are tons of these old, and new, church buildings sitting around everywhere (at least in the southeast).
Church buildings seem to me to be good for nothing sometimes, but perhaps...
that’s the very reason they are good for a lot of things.
Perhaps now the only way many pastors and churches can redeem their buildings are by using them as platforms.
If we decided to stop thinking about this old rickety buildings as too holy to touch, and began to think about them more like community centers... maybe the kingdom could break into these walls and so into hearts for more than one day a week.
If we could make these places not so fragile, not so stiff, not so wifi-less... then really the possibilities for a lot of these buildings are massive.
I predict, (if America is headed the direction of Germany, which I definitely think it is) that in a good 30 to 40 years we will really begin to see a wave of church building abandonment. There’s been all this hoopla lately over this historic old church building in west Nashville. The congregation built a new building and they have been trying to sell their old one. Well they couldn’t sell it, and they can’t keep paying for it when they’re not using it. So they are finally tearing this pretty old church building down.
It’s like this whole news thing in the Tennessean.
Well, I think we should probably get used to it, because I believe it will probably be the first of others to follow around here.
One day we’re going to look up and see all these old fossils, cold and lifeless, empty. And we won’t know what to do with any of them but tear them down or let them sit and rot.
They’ll be like tombstones of some former foreign world when things used to be a lot more structured in our faith.
Maybe, maybe not.
Point is, now there is still a window of opportunity for people to begin using these buildings as platforms for community. If they want to keep their buildings so bad, then they’re going to have to stop worrying about how pretty they are, about if kids run in them, about if there is food in the ‘sanctuary’ (and personally I believe if Jesus was hanging out in one of these buildings, He’d have food in the sanctuary every time He walked in, it’d just be like one big fellowship hall).
These buildings have some opportunity still, sure. But even if they all take advantage of this, they still won’t all be around in a several years... at least that’s my 2 cents.
I’ve always been frustrated by there not really being any good places you can go to read or just hangout that you don’t have to pay. If you go anywhere from a coffee shop to McDonalds you always have to buy something.
I remember when I lived in Germany and had no money at all. I always wanted to just get out of the house and go somewhere and study, or read, or just hang out. But I never had any money to do it. And believe me you don’t always want to be outside..
I just recently found out that the community center down the street that we go to sometimes is about to start charging three dollars to even go in... how stupid.
It’s official now there is nowhere to go for the poor man.
Why can’t the church building be that place. Open door policy. A nice and fun place to hang out, no strings attached. Sure we’ve got coffee and stuff, heck you don’t have to buy it though to hang out here... actually we just might give it to you.
It could be a beautiful thing.
Almost makes me want to have a church building, almost, but not quite ;)
And props to those few congregations out there that are doing that with their facilities in some form or fashion. Just like anything else worth doing, don't find yourself doing it half-way.
The church already has too many things we "produce" that are not-so-amazing quality.
Now, I will take a moment and say that I’m not against having sacred space. I believe we must all have those places that are sacred, set apart, holy, for us to go and meet with our God.
I just believe that if we are going there to meet with the God of Scripture, the God who died on the cross to pay for our sins, we shouldn’t always expect that our encounters with this God will be such a nice and tidy experience.. it’s not a nice and tidy gospel, He’s not a “nice and tidy” God.
He’s the God who calls Himself “Jahweh” “I will be whoever I will be.”
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