Answer These What’s, When’s and How’s Before You Begin

What’s Your Vision?

A vision is a picture of what the church will look like in the future. As the writer of Proverbs stated, where there is no vision, the people perish. That word — “perish” — doesn’t mean “die”; it means to become of no benefit. A stalk of celery is called perishable because it can spoil and become inedible.

It’s a lot like an offensive play in a football game: The vision is to see the receiver cross the goal line for a touchdown. The quarterback has that result in mind when he calls the offensive play. The play called determines the responsibility of every player on the field. The blocker blocks, and the receiver runs his pass routes. All are doing what they’re supposed to do, individually, to accomplish the vision: a touchdown.

Similarly, a church’s vision determines what ministries are developed and what kind of buildings will achieve that goal. A vision statement helps a church determine its overall plan for the future and ensures much simpler decision-making as the church moves forward to accomplish its purpose.

What Should We Build?

One of the interesting trends I’ve observed in church growth is the emerging cradle-to-grave philosophy. It used to be that churches were known for specific types of ministries. Church leaders in high-growth areas knew that to grow, they needed a good children’s ministry. The people moving into their areas were young, married couples concerned about the young children they either had or would have in the future. As communities matured, youth ministry became very important. Then, as they continued to mature, adult and senior-care ministries became very important.

Today, churches understand that trends are changing with regards to attendance patterns. It used to be that people generally attended churches in their neighborhoods. If you moved a few miles away, you looked for a new church. Today’s churchgoers have a more “consumer” mentality; they don’t mind driving to get what they want. In fact, I’ve found that most people will drive as far to attend a church as they do to get to work.

Today’s churches understand that for people to go through life, they shouldn’t have to look for a new church to meet their needs. Before the question of what to build can fully be answered, some additional considerations must be made: Who’s the church reaching? Will a new building help reach more of them? If so, how many? Does the church have the resources to reach them?

Also consider who can be reached (if they’re not currently); who’s in your area but not attending, and why; and what changes the church would need to make to reach them.

The last consideration should be this: What will this church look like in three years, five years, 10 years or 20 years? Is it ready? If not, what’s needed to get it ready? What will this community look like in 20 years, and what does the church need to do to get ready for that? The major decision of what to build can be answered only after all these other questions have been looked at, analyzed and answered.

When Should We Build?

If the need to build is short-term, build at the last possible moment, but in enough time that people aren’t lost. Consider doubling or tripling up on space use.

Also bear in mind a few more factors. A church that’s meeting in a school or temporary facility might need to build as soon as possible if it doesn’t have space for ministry and administrative elements. And an established church needs to consider ministry needs.

Years ago, traditional churches were built to provide worship space and some education space first, and then developed from that point. Modern churches, on the other hand, are building multipurpose facilities first and adding specialized space later.

How Should We Build It?

If you’ve decided what to build and that the time is now, the next major decision is how to do it. Again, a series of questions must be answered before church leaders can finalize this part of the process.

The first question relates to finances: How does a church put together the money to build? Three criteria must be considered before approaching a potential lender:

1. A church can usually borrow about 70 percent of the market value of the building they want to build. Lenders want to know that if something bad happens, they can get their money back by selling the property. Therefore, they’ll make sure there’s an equity spread in the loan package.
2. A church can generally borrow up to three times its annual income.
3. Lenders usually won’t want the monthly payment to exceed one-third of the church’s total monthly income. They want to make sure the church can comfortably service its debt without having to sacrifice ministries or personnel.
4. A church should consider doing a capital fund-raising campaign to go along with its building program. A successful campaign will accomplish two things: 1) raise cash for a down payment, and 2) provide additional funds to make the mortgage payment. As an added benefit, a successful campaign will help unite the church for the building program.

Remember what the pastor said about buildings not “just happening”? If you answer these questions before your building program begins, it will make the process a lot easier.