Give Us More Space

Back during the height of the pandemic, while our new building was under construction, I immersed myself in the last half of the Old Testament prophet Isaiah. There were so many passages there that encouraged me and fired me up. Isaiah 49:20-21 was right up there at the top of the list:

I prayed that this would happen to us. That it would happen post-pandemic, that it would happen in our new building. But I don’t know how much I believed it would actually happen. Would we really run out of space in our new building? Would we really have an influx of new people, of whom we would say, “where did they come from?” As people in metaphorical cultural exile, would we actually see anything like this in our day and age?

We did. By God’s grace, that’s essentially what’s happened over the last two years.

Let me come back to that. You’ve probably heard by now that our plan is to move to two Sunday morning services in the not-too-distant future. We’re going to talk more about that at our congregational meeting on Sunday, November 26. But I want to start giving you the vision for that significant change. And I want to start by acknowledging that in moving to two services, there are various risks and losses.

For example, the loss of a sense of community. What happens when you don’t see everyone in one place at the same time? Does the church end up feeling divided, as if there are now two churches instead of one? Does it become easier for people to slip through the cracks?

Or the risk of losing momentum. Right now the place is jam packed on a Sunday. There’s something about that that’s really exciting. What happens when the place is only half-full for a service? Or one quarter full, because the other service is three-quarters full? Does the wind get sucked out of our sails and growth stall because of it?

Or the risk of not having enough people who are serving. If we don’t have enough people serving in children’s ministry or the hospitality team, people might not experience the same warm welcome. Kids might not benefit from the same kind of discipleship.

What if the whole thing fails? What if we do this, it flops, the church body shrinks, and we go back to one service with our figurative tails tucked between our legs?

I get all of that. Some of that will be up to you and I (I’m thinking here especially about whether we have enough people serving, see last week’s article!). Some of those concerns we’ve already been thinking deeply about, in terms of how to help address them. Some of the concerns are really legitimate. In the end, however, if this is what the Lord is calling us to, then it’s a risk more than worth taking.

And I will tell you that despite all those concerns above, which I share, I do believe this is the Lord’s calling on our church in this moment. And it comes back to that passage in Isaiah 49: give us more space.

Going to two services is not a strategy for growth. It’s a response to the growth that God has brought about among us. He has been bringing so many new people to The Bridge, including many who are exploring Christian faith and church life for the first time (or first time in a long time). But at this point, we’ve pretty much run out of space on Sunday mornings. This move is meant to allow space for the Holy Spirit to keep doing what He’s doing. It’s a missional move. It’s a vision-oriented move. We want to make Jesus Christ known. It’s happening. Let’s make space for it to keep happening.