Church Addtion Dedication

Wow! It's been a bit since I last posted! Gotta fix that. :)

So, the last few days, our church has been a whirlwind of activity (not that it hasn't been for the last 3 years) because WE FINISHED OUR ADDITION!! Praise the Lord! This was an amazing project - adding 15,000 square feet in 2 floors plus a basement that is usable for storage and one classroom. We added a bunch of office space, a much needed main floor large classroom for our ministry to the disabled and an elevator for them, more lobby space and a beautiful new handicapped bathroom. It took 3 years to complete for 2 reasons: #1 we did it with NO debt and #2 the congregation did much of the work once the main shell was up. There were times that the work needed to stop because we just didn't have the money but the project finished up this week with money left over and us spending just $1.8 million dollars when in today's construction market, it should have cost over $3 million! How cool is that?

Today was the dedication of the new building and it was so special. We had a beautiful service with DH leading an amazing worship time and the Daughters of Zion (a group of young girls who dance and use tambourines and streamers in worship) gave a glimpse of what the Daughters of Zion in the Old Testament must have been like. What was even more special was Pastor speaking of the future of the church with the new addition and that it's not the building that's the church but our people and that the children are the future church. He then asked for all of the pastors with young children to come forward to be prayed over and the children dedicated as the future church for God's service - then all of the pastors prayed over the children of the congregation. What a blessing to see the children being brought forward and being dedicated to the service of the Lord. I cried, as usual.

We finally finished up the service with a beautiful song that we just recently learned. It's called God of this City by CBluetree and sung by Chris Tomlin:

You're the God of this city
You're the King of these people
You're the Lord of this nation
You Are

You're the light in the darkness
You're the hope for the hopeless
You're the peace for the restless
You Are

Bridge:
For there is no one like our God
There is no one like our God

Chorus:
Greater things have yet to come
Great things are still to be done
In this city
Greater things are still to come
And greater things are still to be done here

Today's Senses

Another blogger does this periodically and I LOVE when she does it so I figured I'd copy. :)

Outside my window: The sun is shining, the sky is blue and I see my laundry on the line. It's the first day after a 4 day heat wave (oppressive heat) and I have the house wide open to enjoy the day.

I'm thinking: I need to call my new co-leader for VBS refreshments and go over our plan together. I'm also figuring out just what I want to do for my haircut today. Get it cut shorter like I normally do (I let it go a long time between cuts so it always goes back to the same length - still long but shorter than it is now), or leave it long and just get rid of the ends. I think long since it's easier to put it up for the summer.

I am thankful for: windows - to open on days like today!

From the kitchen: I need to decide on dinner for tonight. I was supposed to do my planning and place an order for groceries on Monday but we lost our power for much of the day so now I need to go to the grocery store. With that heat we had, it was hard to figure out meals. Now it's still hot (85 degrees) but not oppressive (98 degrees), so I need to plan out the rest of the week's food. Hmmmm......

I'm wearing: A black v-neck t-shirt with a pair of khaki bermuda shorts. Gotta say I'm LOVING the bermuda shorts. They cover my stretch marks MUCH better than regular shorts. LOL

I'm reading: Other than my Bible, I'm reading "Pierced for Our Transgressions, Rediscovering the Glory of Penal Substitution" Yeah - some light reading for the summer. LOL

Around my house: Robby is playing with trains before we do a little more school to finish out the year and Joanna is finishing up some book work. As I said earlier, I have the house open and the fresh air coming in. Ahhhhhhhh

MOVING DAY!!!

So, 2 years ago, our church embarked on a building project. We had seriously run out of office space (8 offices for a staff of about 17 full time workers and a bunch more part timers), had only a small icky kitchen for our handicapped ministry to meet, no elevator for the handicapped and not enough classroom space for larger classes to meet. So it was decided to seek God and see if we could do this. As usual, this project was going to be undertaken without debt since we feel debt is a curse, so this would be interesting.

Well, now it's 2 years later (about 3 or 4 years since we started collecting for the project), and today is moving day! The office is closed and everyone is in their grubbies. Staff are moving out of their old offices into new offices, or else the staff that had NO office are now moving into space for themselves. There is a room with workstations for part timers (each one will get their own file cabinet that they can roll to the open workstation), and there are such nice spaces now! DH will no longer be sharing his office with the business pastor so he can get some privacy to work on music and his messages for the college ministry.

It's so amazing to see this entire project coming to an end. It was a real labor of love and was a great vehicle to actually minister to the workers who entered our doors. In addition, the congregation not only gave of their wallets but of their time and sweat because much of the work that could be done by us WAS done by us. From putting up sheetrock and putting down subflooring to wallpapering and painting - we saved a tremendous amount of money by picking up bagels and BBQing burgers and dogs to feed the workers who put their sweat equity into the building. In a week and a half, we will have the building dedication - one large service to give this building to the Lord as an offering of our labors - and to dedicate it to His service. I do pray that this new building will not only physically enlarge our territory as Jabez prayed, but that it would enlarge our ministry territory. That it would free us up to be able to grow our Friendship Unlimited ministry (the ministry to the disabled), which is such an amazing outreach to a portion of the population that is often forgotten by the church. That the work of the staff will be made more efficient and in doing so, reach more for the Lord. May God be glorified in all that happens in this new addition. :)

Books

OK - I finally finished one book and just read another book - both of which I want to recommend to all.

The first is "The King James Only Controversy" by James R. White. If anyone has any questions about the whole KJV "only" issue or wants to know about how we have the translations we have and the differences between them, this is an amazing book. It's a pretty easy to follow book and Mr. White has an amazing support of reference material (the bibliography is HUGE as are the footnotes at the end of each chapter), and it's a blessing to read. The book was only $10 or so at Amazon and I think most everyone should have a copy of this. DH will be reading it soon because I think it explains the reasons behind the few differences between the versions and gives great support to the fact that the Bible translations we have today are as accurate and as much the Word of God as the KJV.

The second book is a book that I got from our homeschool presentation night. My co-leader got this at a conference and said it's a must-read for all moms and I read it this morning - fully agreeing with her assessment. The book is called "The Invisible Woman - When Only God Sees" by Nicole Johnson and it will bless all women who feel that what they do is totally invisible to the world. It's a fast read - less than an hour for most readers but it's one that will change the way you look at yourself and how you minister to your family. As for this for your birthday. Save up to get it. I promise you will be blessed.