A note from the City Church Elders.
Dear City Church Family,
We cannot adequately express how grateful we are to the Lord for all of you. We are regularly encouraged by your love for Jesus, your love for one another, and your love for our city. As the Apostle Paul prayed for the church at Philippi, “I thank my God in all my remembrance of you, always in every prayer of mine for you all making my prayer with joy, because of your partnership in the gospel from the first day until now.”
We are very glad to announce that we have signed a lease to build out 1,500 square feet of NEW space that will primarily serve the needs of our Children's Ministry. City Church's current venue space is entirely on the second floor, but there is 4,500 square feet of space below us that is presently vacant. The 1,500 square feet of that space that we are building out will ultimately be connected to our downstairs lobby area and therefore share the same street level entrance that we already use. The additional 3,000 square feet of available space on the downstairs level will remain empty for now, and we may build out that space as well in the coming years.
The new space will consist of three large rooms plus restrooms and some storage areas. Currently upstairs we have three rooms for our Children's Ministry (plus right now we're using the Community Room as a fourth room for kids). When we fininsh the buildout we will have 6 total rooms for children's mininstry plus the Community Room as needed. The downstairs rooms will be larger than the upstairs rooms we're currently using.
Due to the high construction volume in Gainesville we expect that our project will take 7-9 months to complete. We'll keep you posted as things progress!
Why are we building these new classrooms?
- Reason #1: We need more space for kids! Our Children’s Ministry has been growing quickly, thus the need for more space. As we just mentioned – we recently commandeered the Community Room on Sunday mornings for additional children’s ministry space. Building more classrooms will free up the Community Room to be a Community Room once again, plus we’ll be able to provide a more hospitable children’s ministry environment for families. The Children’s Ministry Team will be able to provide more space for more kids plus more space for age-specific teaching down the road (such as for older kids!).
- Reason #2: This space will provide us with new opportunities to love our city. We would love for our space to be even more practical for community use (we already host various community events), and building these classrooms will make our space even more attractive for various community entities.
How can I help?
- Pray a lot. Pray for a smooth buildout process. Pray that the construction would be expedited and that this new space would ultimately be a huge blessing to our kids and to our community.
- Volunteer. Eventually we will need some help with flooring and painting. Our landlord is overseeing the rest of the construction. We’ll let you know when it’s time to lay flooring and paint!
Thanks so much for reading this letter. Praise God for this provision!
Blessings,
Chipper and the City Church Elders