New Building Information & Updates

7/11/2011

Wow! It's been quite a while since I've updated this page. Sorry about that. It goes to show how busy we've been since we moved in.

There's two ways I'm looking at things around here. First, when I look at all that we've accomplished already I'm amazed at how much we've gotten done. A lot of work along with the general cleaning and care of the building and property. But then I look at all that we still have to do and I get overwhelmed sometimes.

That said, we're moving right along with getting everything done. Here's the latest updates:

1. Thanks to Joey Manos, who noticed the Army replacing carpet where he works, was able to get us 30 year commercial carpet that is only 2 years old. (Some of it is brand new!) This is enough to do all of the sanctuary that we wanted to do. We'll start working on that this week and by the end of July we should be finished.

2. I found a great price on quality fabric for drapes on the platform. I have swatches coming in this week to decide what we will get and we should be able to order that soon. We made a about 2/5 of what I need for the drapery material at our recent garage sale so we should be able to raise the rest and get that done soon also.

3. While I'm typing this the sign company just called and they're going to install our new sign tomorrow, 7/12! That's going to be awesome. It's a beautiful sign.

Lastly, I'm still looking for help with the three areas of work in the building, ie. grounds maintenance, cleaning, and building maintenance. If any of you can help out it would be great as most of the load has been on my shoulders so far and I'm unable to do it all alone. Several have volunteered so far and for that I'm very thankful but we still need more hands on deck. If you have any expertise in any area (carpentry, landscaping, electrical, plumbing, cleaning, etc.) please let me know.

That's it for now. Thanks for caring. God bless!

3/19/2011

***WARNING***WARNING***WARNING***WARNING***.

What you are going to see when you get to church tomorrow is nothing short of UGLY! That's right, ugly as sin!

I put up some temporary acoustical sound boards around the church so see if it helps with the echo effect we're getting from sound bouncing off the walls everywhere. So instead of spending several hundred dollars (actually the price to have it professionally made is $5,000.) I thought I'd just put up some sound absorption material as a test to see if it's really what we need. Preliminary tests are positive so far. We'll know better after we have a live service.

Once again, this is only a test so don't freak out when you see what the sanctuary looks like tomorrow.

God Bless all of you and thank you so much to everyone who's been coming whenever to help clean and organize. It's greatly appreciated!

3/10/2011

Well, It’s the morning of and all systems are still a go!!!

Hope to see you all tonight and if not tonight then over the weekend to help us move and clean.

And don’t forget… Sunday, 10:30 a.m. (And don’t forget to move your clocks ahead. How awful would it be for everyone to be one hour late for our first service?)

Hope to see you all soon. Keep me in prayer as I move forward in all this.

3/14/11

Well, I know it's hard to believe but I think we've finally done it! That's right, we have our closing date. Mark this date in history... Thursday, March 10th!!!

It was a long time coming with nothing but setbacks all along the way, but as I've preached and truly do believe, "All things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to His purpose." Rom. 8:28

I already know of several good things that have come out of us having to wait but I believe that as time goes on and we look at this in hindsight we will see even more clearly that this waiting was truly the best thing.

At any rate, here's the schedule for the next week.

1. We are going to have service this Sunday (March 6th) at the First Baptist Church for the last time. Really... I think.

2. Christian Education on Wednesday, March 9th is cancelled. Stay home and enjoy your evening.

3. We will have our closing on Thursday afternoon (March 10th.)

4. That evening (Thursday, March 10th) we will have an open house at 7:00 p.m. so everyone can look around the new church building and see what it's like. (Sis. Frank will be giving a tour of our new home for those interested in seeing the parsonage.) Also, after the closing I will have to be in and out of the building and parsonage and I know you're all curious but please, I have to do several things for the building inspector and it will be very difficult for me if people keep stopping in because you see my car. I'm sorry, but please, wait 'til 7:00. Thanks!

5. Friday afternoon and Saturday we will be moving. "All Hands On Deck!"

6. We will be holding a trial worship service on Saturday evening somewhere around 6:00 or 7:00 p.m. (I'll let Bro. Jamison decide what time he wants to have this.)

7. Last but not least... drum roll please... OUR VERY FIRST SERVICE at 10:30 a.m. on Sunday, March 13!

Congratulations all... we did it!

Any questions you can call me or check back here for updates.

3/4/2011

Sunday service this Sunday (March 6th) is going to be held at 1:00 p.m. at the First Baptist Church. It's pretty certain this will be our final service there as I'm putting together the plans for the coming week now. I was waiting for one final bit of news to come in and it finally came in last night. I'll update you soon.

Check back again during the day for updates.

Again, one last time, the service this Sunday (March 6th) will be at 1:00 at the First Baptist Church.

3/1/2011

Ok, I’m actually starting to feel a little embarrassed. Why? Because I keep making predictions that just aren’t coming to pass. As you can imagine, there is going to be no service or open-house this Wednesday. Again, NO SERVICE OR OPEN-HOUSE THIS WEDNESDAY. So please, stay home and enjoy a free evening. If you think about it, pray for a closing date.

I’m really sorry but that’s just the way it is for right now. There is some good news though. The AG’s office contacted us and said that everything is fine. But… it’s not going to get back to the Judge’s office and back to our lawyer’s office in time to close by Wednesday. I’m holding out for an end of the week closing but I’m fearful that trying to get all three lawyers together with one or two days’ notice may not happen. Please don’t stone me but we may have to meet at the Baptist church one more time.

Now before you go to complaining about me remember the Israelites who when they complained about Moses because things didn’t happen as conveniently as they had hoped were sent a plague. (I’m just grasping for straws here people to try and secure my safety for the next time I see you all.)

At any rate, no service or open-house this Wednesday and I’ll let you know by Thursday where we will be holding service on Sunday. You can find this information out by calling our church line at 518-388-8411 and choosing option #3, by checking back here on our web site, or by calling me directly. (If you absolutely must.)

God bless you all…

2/26/2011

There is delayed good news. (whatever that means.) Unfortunately, the judge decided that the Attorney General's office needed to take a look at our proposal and ok the transaction. The only thing the Attorney General wants is a statement saying that the congregation approves the mortgage. Of course we have the trustee's approval and according to our constitution that is all that's needed but the Attorney General has the right to ask for more. So.... just to give everyone a quick notice, we will be taking a vote this Sunday to approve the mortgage. We will give the details of the mortgage and answer any questions before we vote.

That said, our lawyer is trying to get the closing to take place by Wednesday of this week. That would be great and would keep us on our schedule to have an open house at our new building on Wednesday from 7:00 - ? instead of our regular Christian Education.

Pray earnestly that this will happen! And don't forget to pray for a buyer for our land.

2/19/2011

Well, at this point while we have nothing concrete as far as a closing date is concerned, we do have some positive signs to look to. First, it is confirmed that the lawyers have everything they need to set a closing date.  The only thing we’re waiting for now is one final document with the judge’s signature on it to come in and we’re ready to go.

Although we don’t have that document at this time we did get word on Friday that our paperwork has been assigned to a judge so that means it could come in anytime this week. That said, although we don’t have a closing date my lawyer told me when we get that signed document from the judge we can set a closing date as soon as the next day if all three lawyers can be available. So it will just be a matter of schedules coinciding to make it happen.

So, I’m still holding out that we will have our closing this week and hold our first service on Sunday, February 27th in our new building. I won’t know this information by this Sunday so we will have to be ready, as the Lord told the Israelites, and have our shoes on our feet and our staff in our hands. If for some reason we have to wait another week we’ll just have to scramble and make phone calls, use facebook, twitter, word of mouth, and whatever else you can think of to make sure everyone knows where church will be that week. WE CAN DO THIS!

Keep it all in prayer and don’t forget to pray about a buyer for our land. God Bless you all…

2/11/2011

LAST / FIRST SERVICE UPDATE:

Ok… you know how I preached a couple of Sunday’s ago about waiting on the Lord? And about having a good attitude while we wait? And you know how I preached this past Sunday about how all things working together for the good and that just because things sometime seem to go wrong God meant it for good?

Yeah, well, um, it looks like we’re going to be waiting just a little bit longer before we move into our new building. Our projected first service in our new building on Feb. 20 just got bumped to Feb. 27th.

Why? It appears that a request from the courts (something that has to be done any time not-for-profits are selling) hasn’t come back yet. Unfortunately, it’s highly unlikely that it will come back before the end of next week or even early the week after. At this point it’s out of our hands as we all, us, the lawyers, everyone, has to wait on the judge.

Please pray earnestly that the judge will not sit on this for any length of time as he/she could let it sit on his/her desk as long as he’d/she’d like before signing it.

Now, one final thought. I thought about not setting any more projected starting dates and just say I’ll let you know when we’re ready to move but the truth is you’ve hung in this long with me so I’ve decided to just keep giving you all the updates so there’s no confusion when we actually do move. If you have a hard time handling disappointment this could be a great life lesson for you!

So, the bottom line is that our new projected date for our first service is now February 27th. And like I preached, there’s nothing any of us can do about it so we might as well just wait with a good attitude.

Keep it all in prayer... and don't forget to pray about a buyer for our land.

2/4/2011

NO NEWS IS GOOD NEWS!

That's the latest update. Actually, there is some news and it's all good. We are waiting for one document to come from the sellers lawyer, probably sometime today or Monday, and as soon as we get that document we are ready to schedule the closing date!

So, that said, we are definitely on schedule to close before the 16th of February, go to our planning committee meeting to get our certificate of occupancy on the evening of the 16th, and hold our first service on Sunday, February 20 at 10:30 a.m. WOW! Am I actually starting to feel a little nervous? Yes, I am... pray for me... please!

That means we will be moving all our belongings from the First Baptist Church to our new church building on Thursday, Friday and Saturday the 17th, 18th and 19th. Your help is needed and appreciated. Let me know when you are able to help.

Keep it all in prayer... and don't forget to pray about a buyer for our land.

1/28/11

Ok, here's the latest update. There's good news and bad news. Now, the bad news isn't really that ba… well, you know this line from my last update… soooo…

We had the inspection this week by the city building inspector. Really nice guy who’s working with us and helping us by allowing us some time to do all the necessary items in order to bring both buildings up to code standards. Which brings me to the “not so bad” bad news.

We have several items that need to be updated. Which brings me to the good news and that is that all the items that need updating are relatively minor items. I.e. we need emergency lights installed and exit signs above the doors and several outlets need to be changed out with code approved outlets. That with some peeling paint that needs to be removed is basically all there is to it.

Now, back  to the bad news… we have to have the electrical work done by a licensed electrician so it is going to cost us a little more than just having someone who we know could do the work but isn't’t licensed do it. But that said, the good news is we already have the electrician secured (one approved by the city) and we are set to have the work done the week of  Feb. 7th which means we will get our CO from the inspector before our meeting on the 16th.

All in all I will be working with the lawyers this coming week to see if we can set a closing date since I have an official report from the building inspector along with the schedule of when the work will be done. Everything else is finished as far as requirements for closing is concerned so we should be able to close by the 16th, get our CO on the 16th and it looks like we’re on schedule to hold our first service at 10:30 a.m. on Feb. 20th!!!

I hope to see you there. God Bless you all…

1/21/11

Ok, here's the latest update. There's good news and bad news. Now, the bad news isn't really that bad but the good news isn't really that good either so they both balance each other out. And after all, isn't that the key to life, balance?

First the bad news... while pressing for information when I was at city hall this past week I finally gained understanding as to how the process works. (I'm not a lawyer and I've never done a commercial building project before so I've been figuring things out as I go.) So here's the deal. We can't get a certificate of occupancy (CO from now on) until I appear at the planning committee's meeting and get our project approved. They don't have a meeting until Feb. 16th which is a Wednesday so the earliest we can possibly hold our first service will be Sunday, Feb. 20.

That's the bad news. The good news is that we at least have an actual date we can begin focusing on instead of going on like we have wondering if it might be this week or next... or next... or next... etc.

So, we have the building inspector coming in Wednesday the 26th to inspect for code compliance and things like that and hopefully we don't have to do any major updates. With his stamp of approval we will get our CO at the meeting on the 16th of February. Now that said, we can still close on the building prior to that date and most likely will, we just can't hold services until we get that CO.

My request from all of you is this... that you will pray for all these items (inspection, codes, closing, CO meeting) to work out so that nothing holds us up from getting our CO on the 16th. Otherwise we would have to wait another month for the next planning committee meeting in order to get the CO. And don't forget to continue to pray about the Lord sending a buyer for the land.

Please continue to check back as I will post any pertinent information as soon as I receive it and try to keep everyone updated.

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