Building a Church Building

One afternoon last week I joined the Creekside team at the church building to do some site clean-up and reorganization. Our church has been a lead partner in the financing and construction of a multi-level church building and community centre, to have a significant spiritual and community presence in the centre of Carmen Bajo.

Things got under way about three years ago with a design, blueprints funding and permits, but by North American timetables there should be more done than there presently is. Ah yes, but this is not North America!

An additional plot of land that was purchased has been mostly cleared, but the church needs to get the permission from the neighbors on one side to proceed with construction, complicated by the fact that the owner passed away some time ago and so the permission is needed from all four of her adult children. That alone may take some time!

Not to mention the bureaucracy, red-tape, and at times baffling process of securing permits from the city. This is one building project that requires patience, perhaps even that of Job.

In the midst of the current construction of the second floor, weekly services and ministries go on, with young and old making their way around piles
of rubble and construction materials scattered here and there that would make any Canadian inspector either salivate at the prospect of hefty fines, or make him drop dead of a heart attack.

The ingenuity in all of this is how they manage to use the existing building and land to do ministry, effecting temporary solutions for holes in walls and in the ever-growing new structure to keep the elements out and the property secure. When we were up on the second floor (no guardrails!) I saw that they have heavy duty brown packing paper covering a large gap to keep the rain and wind out of the sanctuary below - it's a good thing it's dry season right now in Quito, and quite temperate.

I got to reflecting that the slow and often plodding process of raising the church building in Carmen Bajo is very much a picture of the process of my life in Christ. A few steps forward, delay and frustration, at times some steps backward, sometimes a pile of trash and rubble left where it shouldn't be, and makeshift coverings for holes in walls to keep the rain out while something else gets finished.

And yet God is there, week after week, meeting people and touching their lives through the people of the church. It may not always look pretty, but it's still beautiful. Hopefully that's true of my life too!

And something is being built to the glory of God, that will one day ... ONE DAY - be complete!