Church Planting Strategy

A few supporters have asked why we need to purchase property now, at this young stage of the church plant.  Here are the major reasons why, taken from http://ibamissions.wordpress.com/ministry/…

The Current Need - With a church established and growing, our next major goal is to purchase property and build a building.  The strategy in this is in order to:

• Give room for growth – We have outgrown our current facility and are going to two Sunday services.  Having an adequate building that gives plenty of room for growth will free up that time for other disciple-making opportunities.
• Establish a permanent presence in the community – In Argentina, many “evangelical” (the name given to any non-Catholic church) churches rent a facility and come and go quickly. However, owning property gives a sense of permanence in the community and security to its members.
• Be wise stewards of our resources -  Loans are not only difficult to obtain in Argentina, but their rates fluctuate and can run 30% or more.  Rent is increased 10% per year and is renegotiated after 3 years.  This makes it unaffordable and unfeasible to stay in a rented facility for more than 3 years.
• Prepare the groundwork to hand over the work to a national pastor – Once the church is alleviated of the burden of a rental contract, it frees up funds to pay a national pastor’s salary.  We want the church to be prepared as soon as possible.

Out of Our Comfort Zone

Church planters say when a building reaches 80% capacity, it’s considered full because visitors feel uncomfortable trying to find a seat and are hesitant to return. Our somewhat awkward facility seats 75 people and we currently average 66 in attendance. In that regard, our building has reached its comfort level! Two core families have agreed to switch to our second service beginning September 18. Pray that this effort will allow us to reach as well as accommodate more people on Sundays.

Inauguration of New Church Building

After three weeks of demolition, construction, and preparation, the Lord gave us a great first Sunday in the new building! The Lord sent the help we needed on Saturday in order to get everything in order. (There are still projects left to complete, but those can be done in time.) It was exciting to be in a larger facility a little more permanent (we’ll at least be there for the next three years). The kids were excited to finally have their own classrom – and we didn’t have to walk two blocks to get there!

One of the most exciting blessings of the morning, though, were the two new families who came. Both of the families had called the BBN radio station looking for a good church, and they “just so happened” to show up on this inauguration day! However, God knows best – if they had shown up prior to this day, they would have felt crowded. (Church planters say that when a building reaches 80% occupacy, people begin to feel uncomfortable and lose their desire to return to that church.)

You can see pictures by clicking here.

We had planned on spending Sunday evening doing evangelism and holding a special service. However, because of concerns regarding the H1N1 virus, the church voted to postpone those activities for now. Since the government is recommending not to meet in large groups and to limit contact outside of one’s home, it would damage our testimony to do something against those recommendations. So, James was able to get “back to being a pastor” and had time to continue his marriage counseling with a couple in the church and Amy was able to go visit the parents of her English student who was recently saved. What a great day! What a great God we serve!