Church Buildings

A friend of mine, who is leading a very succesful church plant in Georgia, went to the opening of their mother-church's building yesterday and came away with some mixed feelings.

Eighteen months ago, in my constant quest to learn more, I took a weekend to visit several churches around the Atlanta area and see what they were doing and how. The mother-church was one of them - seven years old and with over 2,500 people worshiping in a school gymnasium. They did all the things we have been doing for years, arriving early, running cables, setting up lights, preparing children's areas, etc., etc. But this weekend this all came to an end as they opened their new 100,000 square feet facility.

My friend comments that while it was a great celebration, it felt quite different from the gymnasium, maybe a little more formal and "churchy".

That's one reason why I love our movie theater, where my shoes almost got permanently stuck to the floor yesterday because of the thickness of the spilled soda from the night before. It's informal, it's us and it's not about a building.

Now, we'll be continuing our gymnastics with the Town of Brookhaven this year and may well end up suing them for their discrimination against us. I expect to be somewhat further forward by the end of this twelve months and I do look forward to us having a place of our own.

Yet however it can be accomplished, we have to maintain our radical identity once we're in a fixed space. We must never settle back to church as usual.