From the Pastor’s Desk (65)
Our humble trailer has housed us these past two and a half years as we worshipped and ministered here. God has truly done some marvelous things in our midst. We watched as time after time, many came to commit themselves to become followers of Christ, publicly professing their faith by getting baptized. As I write, we are witnessing the number of our house churches tripling from the original six to eighteen and people’s lives being touched and transformed by the work of the Holy Spirit in and through our house church ministry. We are also sensing much personal as well as corporate spiritual growth!
I still vividly remember The Trailer House Renovation Day we had in April 1999. Several men of New Life came out that day and stayed up all night fixing and renovating the place. We also had a workday when many members spent the whole day painting the outside and cleaning the inside before we moved into the place to worship. We were inexperienced and had little idea of what it meant to own a place of worship and take care of it. That’s why even though the trailer house was small and in humble condition there was a great sense of excitement in us when we moved into it. These are very fond memories, stored in a special place of my heart.
Yes, you guessed it, we as a church have now come to a point where we need to make another move! This endeared trailer house is getting small for us. We average about 140-150 adults and 20-30 children these days. The capacity for our trailer house is about 180 but there were several Sundays when we had to set up more than 180 chairs to accommodate everyone who came to worship! Some studies have shown that it feels over-crowded if the space is 80% full. No wonder many have been asking about our space these days!
Beginning Sunday, January 6, 2002 we are going to move into the gym to have our worship service there. This is a big, yet very exciting move! We should have plenty of space to grow and expand as God is pleased with our ministry and blesses us.
In order to make this move, we need everyone’s help and support. First of all, there are several places in the gym that need to be cleaned up, fixed and decorated to make the place look more inviting. Our Administration Team leader, Stephen Park will lead us in this project. Let us make ourselves fully available to complete this before January 6. According to some church growth experts, the church parking lot, restrooms and childcare facilities are the ones that make the first impression to new visitors! Your effort in making our new worship place clean and attractive will not be in vain!
Second, we will need to use more advanced technology when we worship in the gym. All the praise songs will have to be in the powerpoint format to be shown on the big screen. The sound and light systems are bigger and more complicated. The musical instruments need to be set up and taken down to be stored in our storage each Sunday. The trailer will still serve as our other meeting place, office and storage. There is also plenty of room on the stage for more musicians and singers to be added to our praise team. Bobby Bang, our Magnification Team leader, will be in charge of all these and will be recruiting and training many of you!
Lastly, every Sunday before worship, we will need to set up about 200 to 250 chairs and bring out the lattices to enclose the space to make it cozier. Then after worship, we must take them down and clean the gym floor so people can play sports. We need people who can lead this ministry faithfully!
This all sounds like a lot of work but it is exciting because it is a sign that we are growing! We would not be in this situation to serve in this capacity had we been just stagnant without experiencing much growth. All these, actually, can be done without much trouble if you and I act as one, contributors and not consumers.
Imagine a gym-full of people coming together each Sunday to worship God, learn from His Word and be equipped to go out into the world to make a difference for Christ! Let’s do it, friends, with great enthusiasm and optimism, for God is with us!
Your pastor,
Eric
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