LAND AND BUILDING UPDATE 06.01.10
When we moved into Ronald Regan, we honestly thought we would be breaking ground by the end of February. Even though we had done everything our financial advisors told us we needed to do, we could not quite make the numbers work. We either fell just short of the cash we needed, or found ourselves staring at a monthly payment that was well beyond our means.
When it appeared as if we were stuck, we received a serious offer on some of the Parmer frontage. While our original plan called for the sale of some of the frontage, we simply did not think we could find a buyer in the current economy.
We are currently negotiating with our primary buyer to turn two acres of the Parmer frontage into a medical/office complex. If we can suit our buyer’s needs and attract a couple of more interested parties, we will be well along our way to breaking ground by September. If we can sell additional pad sites, we will be able to expand the scope of our building program.
While it is easy to become impatient, I am confident that God has something great in store for us. Please continue to pray that we would move forward in His time, that our people would be generous in supporting the ministry budget and giving to the future fund, and most importantly, that we would allow God to fashion us into the people he desires us to be regardless of where we worship or when we break ground.
Thank you for your faithfulness, patience, and prayer. PK
We are currently negotiating with our primary buyer to turn two acres of the Parmer frontage into a medical/office complex. If we can suit our buyer’s needs and attract a couple of more interested parties, we will be well along our way to breaking ground by September. If we can sell additional pad sites, we will be able to expand the scope of our building program.
While it is easy to become impatient, I am confident that God has something great in store for us. Please continue to pray that we would move forward in His time, that our people would be generous in supporting the ministry budget and giving to the future fund, and most importantly, that we would allow God to fashion us into the people he desires us to be regardless of where we worship or when we break ground.
Thank you for your faithfulness, patience, and prayer. PK
My kids introduced me to David Platt a couple of years ago. I immediately fall in love with the people my kids are falling in love with. I later found out that he plays flag football, with the guy who put together our web page. By the old six degrees of seperation theory, David is practically family. Recently he has released his first book--I think an important one. April and I reading this together, but I thought I would share a blurb with you.
WARNING: What you are about to read may rock your world.
“The youngest megachurch pastor in history.”
While I would dispute that claim, it was nonetheless the label given to me when I went to pastor a large, thriving church in the Deep South—the Church at Brook Hills in Birmingham, Alabama. From the first day I was immersed in strategies for making the church bigger and better. Authors I respect greatly wouldmake statements such as, “Decide how big you want your church to be, and go for it, whether that’s five, ten, or twenty thousand members.” Soon my name was near the top of the list of pastors of the fastest-growingU.S. churches.There I was…living out the American church dream.
But I foundmyself becoming uneasy. For one thing,mymodel in ministry is a guy who spent the majority of his ministry time with twelve men. A guy who, when he left this earth, had only about 120 people who were actually sticking around and doing what he told them to do. More like a minichurch, really. Jesus Christ—the youngest minichurch pastor in history.
So how was I to reconcile the fact that I was now pastoring thousands of people with the fact that my greatest example in ministry was known for turning away thousands of people? Whenever the crowd got big, he’d say something such as, “Unless you eat the flesh of the Son ofMan and drink his blood, you have no life in you.” Not exactly the sharpest church-growth tactic. I can almost picture the looks on the disciples’ faces. “No, not the drink-my-blood speech! We’ll never get on the list of the fastestgrowing
movements if you keep asking them to eat you.”
By the end of that speech, all the crowds had left, and only twelve men remained.2 Jesus apparently wasn’t interested in marketing himself to the masses. His invitations to potential followers were clearlymore costly than the crowds were ready to accept, and he seemed to be okay with that.He focused instead on the few who believed himwhen he said radical things. And through their radical obedience to him, he turned the course of history in a new direction.