What Was "Vision Night"?

Recently, I had an occasion to give a talk in response to the question, “When will we break ground for the new building?” You can hear my talk here.

I’d like to summarize my answer for you here:

Building Process
October 2022 – We met with a local contractor to determine the estimated cost for the new building.
1.) The cost (at that time) was determined to be approximately $7 million to include site development, A/V/L, furnishings, and architecture firm.
2.) The bank would loan us $5 million IF we raised $2 million and increased our General Fund giving to $1.25 million annually.
3.) We began “For The One” in April 2023 with those numbers in mind.

Where we are today:
1.) “Increase our General Fund to $1.25 million.”

• 2025 GF giving was over $1.3 million!

2.) “Raise $2 million through a capital campaign.”

• On pace to reach this goal in May ‘26

We have completed Phase I of the building process
1.) Floorplan and Master Site Plan
2.) Code-compliant site plan through a civil engineer
3.) Soil testing/borings
4.) Waterflow testing
5.) Topographic survey
6.) Civil Feasibility
7.) Exterior and Interior renderings
8.) Fly through video (view here)
9.) Preliminary Rough Order of Magnitude budget

Here is a rendering of the exterior

Current Reality
Since our initial meeting in October 2022, the estimated building cost is now projected to be over $10 million.

WHAT WE HAVE DONE
1.) Decreased the size of the original building plan

• 24,000+ SF in 2016 plan
• 18,550 SF in 2026 plan

2.) Eliminated the coffee shop and café
3.) The staff has been meeting to pray at 12:30p everyday since August

Eliminating the coffee shop and cafe may not seem like much to some of you, but to me it represented the opportunity to make our campus a 7-day-a-week destination as well as provide the incentive for people to linger longer on campus after their weekend encounters with God. You can see that in Phase 2, the offices and coffee shop would be added.

WHAT WE CANNOT DO
Reduce the size of the building to what we can afford now.  An auditorium that seats 500 will only allow us to be more comfortable, NOT reach more people. We will not invest millions of dollars for our comfort!

HOW WILL WE RESPOND?
I admit that in the meeting where that information was delivered, I might have cried 2-3 times, even though I had been predicting it privately for weeks, but then I turned to the Lord, and these are what I felt I heard from Him and realized we must do:
1.) “Build what you need, not what you can afford.”
2.) See the miracle as getting bigger.
3.) Allow Jesus to build His Church.
4.) Humbly and earnestly seek God.

HOW TO PRAY?
1.) Grow OUR faith!
2.) Build YOUR church!
3.) Show ME what I can do

God’s blessings on our church are unprecedented, and I know He will provide, but the way He will do that is by growing us to be the people who are ready to occupy the building He is going to provide, and it is going to take all of us to succeed.

THREE MIRACLES I’D LOVE TO SEE!
1.) Buy the old Circle K for our Food Pantry and Outreach Center
2.) Acquire the 7 acres adjacent to the south edge of our property (ballfields, gym, garage)
3.) Break ground next Spring

Let’s pay cash for it all so we can devote the money that would go towards the mortgage ($40,000 per month) could be invested in our outreach to our community and the world!