All I Want for Christmas is a Building--Lessons Learned

Orginally published on Thursday, December 21, 2006 at 1:02 PM
by Rick White

Many pastors still follow yesterday's "rules" for church-starting without giving a second thought to whether the "rules" have changed. Of course, there are no rules that apply to every church in every situation...but there are undeniable general-trends for every generation. For instance, in the early 90's, Rick Warren wrote that new churches should hold out as long as they possibly can to buy land and build (or buy) a building. His main point was that churches generally build too small and too quickly and stunt future growth. The other point (though not explicitly made) was that most people will put up with meeting in high schools, theatres, etc. longer because they were non-traditional "neutral" locations--prime spots for reaching the seekers that new churches yearn to impact.

Until being challenged by another pastor on this point last year, I probably continued to hold this view in one form or another.  The main point of the pastor that challenged my thinking was that people’s lives are far too unstable in today’s world...corporate down-sizing...family break ups...Lost taking a 3-month hiatus after airing only 6 episodes.  You get the point.

Instability seems to be a common denominator in many people’s lives.  This trend is only magnified by the specialization chains that go beyond burgers and fries to coffee...doughnuts and even church (Fellowship.com and Lifechurch.tv, anyone?).  Like it or not, Starbucks is a big hit because it’s the same everywhere you go...much to my bohemian friends’ disapproval.

People will only tolerate so much instability in their life until they begin viewing potential jobs, friends and churches through the lenses of stability vs. instability.  In light of this societal trend, new churches will need to think through facility issues quicker than before.  Since money is always an issue in a new church, two things will need to take place to overcome the challenges associated with finding a more permanent meeting space.

First, funding-sources for new churches will have to be changed AND expanded.  Current funding organizations (denominations and the like) will not only need to consider raising their church-starting budgets, but also be more selective and intentional in the assessment process.  The recent investigations with the Baptist General Convention of Texas (BGCT) only highlights the need to be more careful in who gets funded and who makes the decisions on who gets funded.  In addition, follow-up and coaching cannot be ignored.

Second, lead pastors for new churches need to be more flexible about what it looks like to get into a more permanent facility.  In our area (The Alliance Texas Corridor), we deal with most every difficult issue involved with finding a permanent facility...except for land availability (land is plentiful, still).  While land is plentiful, it’s incredibly expensive...inflated by the speculation of continued growth and development (a good speculation, based on recent history).

Since most of our area was cattle-land ten years ago, there aren’t mid-sized and larger buildings (10k-50k square feet) that have existed any longer than a few years...so there’s a very small market for available space outside of strip-centers...which can carry their own stigma, depending on your community.  If you DO happen to find a favorable price on land, building a structure is crazy-expensive, no matter where you live.

All this to say...new churches cannot be overly-picky with what is available in their community and must be super-creative in how to get into said-buildings.  For instance, most of the lead pastors of new churches in our area will sacrifice quite a bit to get into what they perceive as a “nice” facility.  Sometimes they’ll over-borrow or move outside their target-area (where their current people live) to have a nicer facility.

While many churches can and will survive such a decision, there are plenty of churches that could not and did not survive under either scenario.  Meanwhile, most of the few buildings available in our area are warehouse-like metal buildings that look like they might be better for storage than used as a church.  However, with a little time money, these buildings can be upgraded to fit a church’s needs.

I’m simply astonished at how many of these less-desirable structures never get a second look.  Seriously...it’s probably only a stop-off point on your way to buying some land...so why not take a look at a building that’s not ideal, but at least serves as a statement to your community that you’re staying...that you’re not going away...that you are planting roots...that you are a place of stability that will be giving to your community for years to come.  While it took me a while to see this, I pray that these words might serve to encourage others that are in the planning stages of their new church.  For me, it’s a lesson learned.

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Rick White is the lead pastor of CityView Church—a new church located in the Alliance-Texas Corridor, north of Fort Worth.  CityView is committed to keeping Jesus and His Gospel as the central focus of their mission and message.  CityView was planted by The Village Church and is a part of the Acts29 Network. Rick and his wife of 11 years are proud parents of three children.  You can read more of Rick’s writings at his blog, ”The 20 Year Baton”. He can be contacted via email at

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