When Not to Build

When pastor and people properly see buildings as tools for God’s work, then it is time to build.
—Ray Bowman with Eddy Hall

When a young, growing church in suburban Philadelphia asked me to design them a thousand-seat sanctuary, that’s exactly what I expected to do. They had called me for the usual reasons: their sanctuary was full and they were running out of Sunday school space. They reasoned it was time to build.

My wife, Sally, and I, working as a team, met with the church board for four hours on a Saturday morning to get all the information we could. During the next several days we scrutinized the church’s facility usage, finances, and ministries. With additional input from the church growth committee, we developed a comprehensive plan to accommodate the church’s growth.

The next Saturday, we presented our report to the board. Sally and I were no less surprised by our recommendation than they must have been. “What you really need to build,” I announced, “is a storage building.”

Had the church invited me a year earlier, I would have designed a thousand-seat sanctuary and cheered them on. “The building will bring more people to Christ,” I’d likely have said. “Its beauty will draw you closer to God. People will notice that you’re here and that you’re an important part of the community.”

During twenty-three years of designing church buildings, I had heard these statements from pastors and church boards. For twenty-three years, I’d seen no reason not to accept the assumption that bigger buildings translate into greater ministry.

But then Sally and I began church consulting. It was this new hat I was wearing—consultant rather than architect—that made the difference. As consultants, we had studied this fast-growing church through new eyes and had arrived at a startling conclusion: a major building program at that time would in all likelihood stop the church’s growth and create financial bondage for years to come.

There is, we had been forced to see, a time not to build.

As we’ve consulted with scores of churches in the six years following our Philadelphia trip, we have identified factors that indicate whether construction will help or hinder a church in carrying out its mission. They fall into three categories.

Seek other alternatives

A church should not build when a better alternative is available.

As Sally and I studied the Philadelphia church, we agreed at once that it had a space problem. At its rate of growth, the congregation would soon outgrow the worship space. Between Sunday school and the Christian school, the educational space was full. The church had no room for additional staff offices. Construction appeared to be the obvious solution.

But it was also the wrong one.

“I found a room filled with missionary boxes,” I told the board. “Those boxes don’t need heat, lighting, windows, or carpeting.” We recommended they store the boxes in a low-cost storage and maintenance building to free up that space for educational use.

“This barn on your property is a historic structure worth preserving,” I also told them, “but you’re not getting the best use out of it.” Then we discussed how they could remodel it into a gymnasium and add a kitchen and educational space at half the cost of a comparable new structure.

“You can meet your worship needs for years to come,” I went on, “without the tremendous cost of a new sanctuary.” The wall between the existing sanctuary and foyer could be removed to enlarge their worship area. A modest addition could provide a new, larger foyer, one that would make it practical to hold two Sunday morning services. That immediately doubled their worship seating capacity. The new addition could also house the office space they would soon need for their growing staff.

Finally, we suggested they replace the fixed pews with movable seating. For the comparatively low cost of new seating, the church could use the largest single space in the building for a wide range of activities, space that would otherwise lie useless for all but a few hours a week.

The church accepted the suggestions, completing their remodeling and modest construction projects within a couple of years. From 350 people at the time of our visit, the church has kept reaching the unchurched, and now, six years later, is running 850.

What would have happened had the church gone ahead with their building plans six years ago? The growth histories of other churches suggest the answer.

A burgeoning church launches a major building program to create space for more growth, taking on heavy debt. Though not by design, the building program becomes the congregation’s focus. People give correspondingly less attention to the outreach ministries that have been producing growth. Church attendance peaks, drops slightly, and levels off. With their mind-set now changed from growth to maintenance, the church may continue for decades with no significant growth.

Whenever the church seeks creative alternatives to building prematurely, however, “people ministry” can continue uninterrupted, and growth continues. Later, when growth requires still more space, a well-planned building that will be fully utilized can be built without interfering with the work of the church.

Many churches call consultants because they believe they need a new building; few actually do. What most need is a way to use their existing buildings more effectively.

A church doesn’t need more space until it is fully using the space it already has. Full utilization almost always means multi-purpose use of space. This may call for such moderate-cost alternatives as remodeling, refurnishing, or making modest additions. In many cases, though, it requires no money; only a willingness to do things differently.

Minimize debt

A church should not build when building would increase the risk of financial bondage.

When the Philadelphia church commissioned our study, it was still indebted for the existing building. The congregation planned to borrow most of the money for their new one, but the loan payment would have been larger than their existing congregation could have met. Their ability to repay the loan depended on growth.

To build, the church would have been forced to redirect to the building fund much of the money then being used for needs within the body, local outreach, and missions. The congregation lacked the financial strength to maintain, much less expand, their present level of people ministry while constructing a building. Building, far from furthering the church’s work, would have crippled its ministry.

We recommended that this congregation convert their finances to a provision plan, paying as God provided. This meant they would first pay off their existing mortgage. Then they would do the necessary remodeling and build their modest additions on a cash basis.

Operating on provision would mean setting aside regularly for future building needs so the congregation could pay cash or borrow substantially less for their next building. The many thousands of dollars saved on interest would be freed for the church’s true work—ministering to people.

The church followed this plan, paying off their debt and expanding the facilities on a cash basis. They also began setting aside funds regularly so they could pay cash for an anticipated building program in five years.

Because they are not saddled with debt, they have been free to invest increasing amounts in ministry to people—their Christian school, an inner-city mission in a nearby neighborhood. By not building at the wrong time, the congregation enjoys a financial freedom that allows them to minister to more people than ever before.

Today, six years after our study, the right time to build has come. The church is building—and without pulling funds away from its essential work.

Scrutinize motivations

A church should not build if its reasons for building are wrong.

Richard Foster describes the first building program he was involved in: “It was actually a rather small project—an educational unit that was to double as a day-care center. We had all the right reasons for needing such a facility. We had gone through all the appropriate committees. We had the architect’s drawings and had even launched a fund drive.”

A congregational meeting was called to pray for God’s guidance on the decision. “I went into the meeting thinking that probably we should build, and left certain that we should not,” Foster writes. “The crucial turning point came when I saw the driving force behind my desiring that building to be my unarticulated feeling that a building program was the sign of a successful pastor. Theologically and philosophically, I did not believe that, but as we worshiped the Lord, the true condition of my heart was revealed. Eventually, we decided against building, a decision now validated by hindsight.”

Years ago a church of about 150 people in Arkansas hired me as architect to design a new sanctuary. When I saw their building, I was puzzled. Though the building was older, its location was good and the congregation had never filled it.

Finally, I asked the pastor, “Why do you want a new building?”

“These people haven’t done anything significant for twenty-five years,” he answered. “This is a way to get them to do something significant. Second, the people aren’t giving at anywhere near the level they could or should be. A building program will motivate them to give more. Third, a building program will unite the people behind a common goal.”

I could understand his concerns, but this pastor was looking to a building program as a substitute for the spiritual work of the church. He was trying to do something that never works: solve nonbuilding problems with a building.

A congregation of about 175 on the West Coast brought us in as consultants, but only after they had put up the shell of their new building. Someone had offered the church a piece of land visible from the interstate at a bargain price. The church had jumped at it.

Confident that an attractive, highly visible building would stimulate growth, they were building a luxurious thousand-seat sanctuary. “We didn’t want the inconvenience of building in phases,” the pastor explained, “so we built it all at once. I believe that if we just have the faith and the vision, God will provide the money.”

By the time we arrived, the church, for all practical purposes, was bankrupt. All we could do was commiserate with the congregation and sadly recommend they board up the unfinished shell, keep using their old building, and wait until future developments enabled them to complete their move.

In a bigger-is-better world, the church is not immune to the temptation to see church buildings as signs of success or statements to the community or substitutes for ministry. For the most part, buildings are tools. When a church wants to build for reasons short of providing a fitting and functional tool to facilitate ministry, it is time not to build.

When to build

But there is a time to build.

When a growing church is so fully utilizing its facilities that it can find no alternative to building that is less costly in time, energy, and money, it passes the need test.

When a church is living within the income God has provided and can build without dipping into funds needed for people ministry, the church passes the readiness test.

And having passed these tests, when pastor and people properly see buildings as tools for God’s work, then it is time to build.

The church in Philadelphia has grown faster than we projected and so has had to launch its building program a year earlier than originally planned. Although the building will cost $1.1 million, the congregation is paying cash for it. And this building is not even a sanctuary; it’s an education and fellowship center. Why? Because that’s what the people need.

The design plans for their new thousand-seat worship space (now called a ministering center rather than a sanctuary) are ready and waiting. When the time is right, they will build it. But first, a couple of things need to happen. Sometime in the next year or two, the church will slip over from two worship services and Sunday schools to three. Then, over the next few years, probably all three hours will fill. Only then will they need more space. Until then, the church keeps setting aside funds for building.

Some day, probably five to seven years from now, Lord willing, the church will get out the design plans, dust them off, and hire a contractor.

Then, it will be time to build.