WILLOW Magazine, Issue 1, 2004
When Perseverance Pays Off
A building program for a smaller church proves to be no less daunting
Imagine hearing your alarm go off at 5:30 a.m. On a Sunday. Getting out of a warm bed on a cold morning to load up a truck with equipment and set up for a church service. Seven hours later you tear down and haul equipment back to storage, finally returning home.
Now imagine doing that every Sunday for 13 years.
That was the reality for members at Kalamazoo Community Church (KCC), in Kalamazoo, Mich. “We’ve used six facilities in our thirteen years — middle schools, high schools, a YMCA, and an office building,” said Senior Pastor Dave Johnson.
Although church members were faithful to sacrifice sleep and face early morning setup duties for over a decade, it was tiring. When the church purchased property several years ago, the first of a series of attempts to build began. Those initial attempts failed.
“We as a church really got serious about building when we decided to make this a grassroots movement, not a pastoral decision. If we were going to build, we were going to have to leave it up to the Lord and to our congregation,” said Johnson, who came on board at KCC in 2000.
The congregation responded. “We had home meetings where church members would talk and pray about a building plan with different ministry leaders and staff,” said Johnson. Consensus among the members grew, along with excitement about what a building of their own could mean.
“What really motivated us to build was not that we needed to have a building because that’s what you’re ‘supposed to do’ or that ‘every church has a building,’” said Johnson. “The motivation was simply ministry. Using a high school building was hindering our ability to do ministry. We could all see it and feel it.”
Because the school used the auditorium during the week and for various events on weekends, the congregation felt hampered.
“We faced enormous limitations on what we could do,” said Johnson. “There were people in our community that we knew we weren’t reaching. It was difficult to see how we would ever be able to reach them without the freedom that comes from having your own facility.”
Although actual construction took about a year and a half, the entire process — from the initial dreaming to opening the doors — took nearly four years.
Sounding the Call … to Stewardship
With a clear decision to “go for it” from the church body, KCC leadership decided to get help. The church hired an outside consultant — Cargill Associates — to help them raise funds for the building project.
“One of the reasons we chose Cargill over some other firms is that their program is really about financial stewardship, not just fundraising,” said Johnson. “As a seeker-targeted church we were reluctant to talk about money. We didn’t want people coming on a Sunday morning to get a negative impression or misjudge what we were really about.”
Cargill’s approach fit well with KCC’s commitment to building. Cargill will not undertake a campaign “until the need is established and members are unified in their pursuit of a goal to meet the need.”
Over the course of 18 months, they were able to raise the funds for the building … and more. “Our general fund budget was zero growth in 2003, and yet we took in quite a bit more than we had budgeted. And that was in addition to money raised through our building fund,” said Johnson.
After seeing the congregation’s faithful giving to the initial building fund, KCC’s leadership took a step of faith in developing this year’s budget. Using Cargill again they are undertaking a three-year campaign to eliminate their debt and raise money for a few smaller projects they would like to finish in their new building.
Designing with Purpose
Stewardship is a theme that runs through KCC’s building plans. In addition to wisely using their financial resources, the staff and leadership felt strongly that the building needed to be designed in such a way that every room could be used for multiple purposes.
“The reality is that as a relatively small church, we have to make sure that every room is used to its fullest potential,” said Johnson.
Although KCC’s building might seem small compared to some (their auditorium seating capacity is 400 and children’s ministry area is designed for 120), that doesn’t mean they sacrificed quality.
For example, a large focus of KCC’s building design was their arts ministry. “God has blessed us with enormous arts capabilities and talents for a church our size. We needed to recognize and honor that. So we factored into the building plan and budget to have a really top-notch stage and audiovisual abilities and equipment.”
Growing Wide … Growing Deep
Since opening doors to their new facility on September 19, 2003, KCC has seen their Sunday attendance jump from a maximum of 250 to a consistent average of 325.
“What’s really exciting is not just that we’re seeing growth, but where we’re seeing it,” said Johnson. KCC holds a Sunday school hour and then a 30-minute “family worship time.” After that is the main “Discovery” service.
“What surprised us is to see that the number of new people who are coming to our family worship time is growing almost to same extent as the Discovery service,” said Johnson.
But it’s not just Sunday attendance that is on the increase. “There’s an increased mentality of our church body to really invade this area around us,” said Johnson. “Through a recent survey, we’ve found that our church isn’t nearly as diverse as our surrounding community. For example, there is a large single parent population in our neighboring communities and we’d love to engage them in some helpful way.”
As a pastor, Johnson is excited to see his congregation grow in their ability to envision ministry in their new facility. “There are a lot of things that our people are starting to want to do to make a difference. And that’s exciting because that’s volunteer-led. Our building is providing them with tools to do it. We as staff just want to come alongside them and help them succeed.”
Lessons Learned
Having just celebrated their first Easter in the new building, Johnson looks back over the building process and reflects on lessons he and the church learned.
“I think for me there were two main lessons. The first was to pray. Pray, pray, pray, pray, pray! The second was to communicate like crazy with the congregation.”
“We thought we were communicating about where we were in the process and what was going on with the building plan. In fact we thought we were talking about it too much!” said Johnson. “But about a year or two into it we realized that there were people who didn’t know where we were at all.”
Johnson realized that his congregation — seekers and believers — wanted to know more. “It was a surprising freedom to be able to talk more openly about financial issues such as our building budget and debt.
“What we discovered is that we had a large number of seekers who really bought into this as their church. They’re coming to this church for a reason and they wanted to make sure that this thing — our building plan — succeeded,” said Johnson. “So we gave those issues a higher profile in our communications plan.”
Encouragement from the Field
What advice would Johnson give to churches that are debating over whether or not to build? “The obvious answer is spend the time in prayer. But also, really examine what your motives are. Know exactly why you want to build and what specific things you are going to do when God says go for it.”
Years of prayer, patience, and preparation are paying off as the Kalamazoo congregation now races hard to fulfill the unique dream God has given them.
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