Pastor's Blog: An Exemplary Church
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This past Wednesday our church came together at our Semi-Annual Church Conference to receive the final report and recommendation of our Vision 2020 Building Committee. The recommendation also came to the congregation with the unanimous support of the Deacons and Trustees. After hearing the presentation and following a time of discussion, the members in attendance voted overwhelmingly to approve the recommendation to proceed with the proposal as presented and to prepare for a Capital Campaign, which will help us to gauge how much of the proposal we feel God leading us to undertake.
I must tell you that I left the Church Conference even prouder of our fellowship than I had been going into the meeting. Throughout the process participants in the various conversations have spoken frankly, passionately, and respectfully. Just as importantly, others have received their comments in the same spirit. Trust me when I tell you that not every church can go through such an exercise and come out on the other side with hands and hearts together, but ours has! What that consensus tells me is that Mountain Brook Baptist Church is no ordinary fellowship; we are an exemplary church in every sense of the word.
For those of you who weren’t present on Wednesday night, I prefaced the Building Committee’s presentation by offering a statement in which I emphasized how exemplariness was precisely my vision for our church. I believe so very strongly that God is calling MBBC to set an example of faithfulness for other congregations, both near and far, as to how a church gives its attention to worship, discipleship, outreach, missions, fellowship, and facilities. If you go back and look at the Vision 2020 final report, each of these areas is addressed with our strategic plan and an accompanying “thumbnail proposal.”
Ideally, facilities “facilitate” ministry. For the most part ours do. But the challenges we face in terms of our facilities at MBBC are ones addressed by the recently adopted plan in a way that will enable us “to make ministry (more) possible.”
The next step will be to open ourselves to God’s leadership in terms of what level of financial commitment we will make to the project. Even now the lay leadership of our church is putting together a Capital Campaign team, which the Nominating Committee will recommend first to the Deacons and then to the Church. This recommendation will come in February, which will enable us to begin an “advance” phase this spring and a “public” phase in the fall. I am excited about the spiritual benefits that will come to each of us as we prayerfully consider God’s guidance in this matter.
Mountain Brook Baptist Church is not an “ordinary” church (as if any church can ever be described in that way). Our congregation is made up of the “best and brightest” in our region, people who make a significant impact in so many areas of life. That’s all the more reason for our church to do the same in terms of our faith commitments so that others might follow our lead and the cause of Christ be more significantly advanced.
“Let your light so shine before others, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven” (Matthew 5:16).