The Need for a Property

We started preaching through the book of Nehemiah in January, and are just about through the narrative of the building of the Jerusalem wall, with all the challenges from without and within.  Before Nehemiah even asked King Artaxerxes to return and build the broken down wall, we read he prayed for 3-4 months.  The challenge to our young congregation was to spend the first 4 months of this year prayers.

Those four months have passed.   On May 6, the first Sunday of the fifth month, we celebrated the recognition of two elders and their wives.  Good leadership, frankly, is more important and often more difficult to see realized than is a property.  Certainly the local church can exist, and does exist in many parts of the world without an actual church building.  So far, the two-year-old church in Jesús María has met in a small, two-bedroom house (initially for 14 months) and now a rented room on the second floor, with a store below (for the last year).

The problem is...we're outgrowing the second place now.  The 65 black chairs we squeeze in every Sunday have to be supplemented by the colorful plastic stools.  The worship team has to sit behind their instruments, because there's just no more space.  We need a bigger place to meet, our own place, that will allow more growth, more flexibility.

Below is the sort of place that we'd like to be able to buy.  Our search has begun in earnest.  Our goal...to purchase a suitable property or a building that could be modified by this time 2013.

If you'd like to contribute, go to this link https://secure.caminternational.org/index.cfm?go=donate_online , and type in the account number 063604 in the project line.

Quote of the Day: The message of biblical Christianity is not “God loves me, period,” as if we were the object of our own faith. The message of biblical Christianity is “God loves me so that I might make him— his ways, his salvation, his glory, and his greatness— known among all nations.” Now God is the object of our faith, and Christianity centers around him. We are not the end of the gospel; God is.
Platt, David, Radical: Taking Back Your Faith from the American Dream (pp. 70-71).