Todd and I spent this past Valentine’s Day weekend meeting with a wonderful church in the city of Montreal. Its official name is the Italian Pentecostal Christian Church of Montreal, but it is better known as Fabre St Pentecostal church. Founded in 1920, this church has been faithfully serving the Italian- Canadian community of Montreal. I must admit that I’m not sure that I have met a more welcoming and hospitable church with a heartfelt desire to operate with excellence. They accepted us as family, and I have no doubt that I gained a few pounds over the weekend.
What we experienced in our time there was similar to experiences that we have had with many churches in the past. This is a church with multiple thriving ministries, a dedicated congregation, and a well defined vision for future growth, but it is contained within a facility that negatively shapes their ministries, and inaccurately defines them as a church. Most churches tend to grow accidentally in a painful reaction to desperate needs over time. Since the solution is an intense reaction to a single need the solution is usually damaging. In this way many church facilities grow like bacteria in what appears to be a random fashion. It is difficult to fault the church for growing in this fashion. In the case of Fabre they are contained by an inner city neighborhood of row homes, and their growth included the purchase of many of the neighboring homes, which they then modified for ministry use. Since these homes were not designed for church use, they are certainly not an ideal place to grow ministries. The rooms are small; there are multiple level changes and circuitous and narrow halls to navigate. All of this can be quite intimidating to a first time visitor. But converting existing construction is also a wise use of limited funds.
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Tags: Church
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These words, taken from the website and membership material of Cornerstone Bible Fellowship in Hamilton, Bermuda, served as a guiding light in their selection of an architect for their new facility. Prayer has the highest value in the formation of that church, and they wanted an architect that shared that value; not just a Christian architect or even a church-design specialist, but an architect that prays. This is my account of how the Lord connected us with Cornerstone.
The Lord often guides through what I call “Divine coincidences”. These are incidents that cause most people to exclaim “what a coincidence!” while causing people of faith to proclaim Divine involvement. This, from the faith-perspective, is when seemingly unrelated circumstances and situations coincide in such a way as to facilitate God’s plans and purposes. Tuesday, April 21, 2009 was a day of such “coincidences”.
For years, WPH has had office prayer on Tuesday mornings. Attendance and participation is voluntary yet paid-for. We started this in 1999 to connect our employees spiritually, to remind us of who we are serving in our work, and, practically, to ask God for His help in the many ways that we need it. We pray for the churches we work with, pray for pastors and building committee members, pray for employee’s family members and many other things. And it was on a Tuesday morning at 9:30 – just as we were about to start office prayer - that the building committee chair for Cornerstone Bible Fellowship called. Continue Reading »
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There has been quite a hiatus in blog posts to The Ministry Café. (If you subscribe to the RSS feed, you probably have wondered what’s happened.) We’ve gone through a challenging season - along with most other businesses - and getting through it has taken priority over new posts. But as a new year often brings with it reflections, I’ll share some of mine here.
2009 was a year of set-backs and scale-down for survival. The architectural service sector was among the hardest hit in the economy, with up to 60% unemployed. For a company like ours that works exclusively with Christian ministries, it was no less challenging, as pastors and leaders did not have the heart to ask their people to give to a new building program when many in the congregation have lost jobs and perhaps houses as well.
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As I noted in my previous post, I wanted to share a bit about one of our partner churches, Calvary Baptist Church in Bethlehem, PA, who recently broke ground on a new campus. (To see photos and news of their recent groundbreaking event go to: http://thecalvaryconnection.org/?cat=4 ) They purchased 27 acres in a prime location at the intersection of Routes 22 & 33. The new facility will be seen by thousands of daily commuters along the Route 22 corridor, which extends to New York City. Their new property is in the fastest growing region in Pennsylvania.
From the day the Church settled on the land, they began holding Church / community-outreach events on the property, including bonfires and hayrides. During one Saturday night event, Continue Reading »
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