Our church is out of space. I mean really out of space. The sanctuary at our largest campus is built to hold 400 people. We’re putting 550 chairs in that room, and seeing an average of 525 adults per gathering. It’s unpleasant. We added identical gatherings on Sunday night and Thursday night just to relieve the pressure on Sunday morning. We launched two other campuses. But still, we run at 98% capacity. We close every kids classroom, every week at almost every service due to capacity. So when I say we need a new building, that’s not “pastor speak” for “If you build it, they will come”. They’re already here and we have nowhere to put them.

Recently, as a part of the public phase of our generosity initiative, we unveiled early plans for our new building via the video above. There are a couple things I want to point out about the video from a learning standpoint.

1. We don’t have any real plans yet for the building. It’s a big box and we’re going to cut it up. That’s about all we know. We actually just had our first meeting with the architect a couple days ago. But we didn’t want to just film our Lead Pastor standing in front of a vacant retail space saying “Here it is”. That’s boring, and kind of ugly. So we made some rough napkin sketches of what the layout of the building could be. We also looked at some other church layouts that we liked and dropped their drawings in (removing any reference to the church). Then, one of our tech guys took those layouts and built a 3d model of it so that we could fly into and through the building. Lastly, I asked one of our graphic designers who just happens to have a degree in architecture to dream up a new facade for the circa 1970’s building. It’s actually a pretty awesome drawing.

2. So we used all this art in the video but you’ll notice a very clear note at the bottom that says “Early Concept Sketches”. That’s because the last thing I need is a bunch of people emailing me saying “you forgot the bathrooms”, “where is the cry room?”, “that stage is not big enough”, etc. etc. So we made it obvious that these are just dreams. In fact, some of the drawings are literally on napkins.

3. We used a drone. Because drones are really hot right now, but not everyone has one. They are still too pricey. So a film producer in the church used his for us for free. It created a “wow” factor and a place for the music to swell. It also showed the shear size of our new building (78,000 sq. feet).

4. We showed Phase 2, which we hope will include a gym and an indoor playground. This is the time to inspire people. We certainly run the risk that we won’t be able to build that for awhile, but I’m ok with that.

5. We demonstrated need through b-roll footage.

6. Lastly, we kept it fun, because it is fun.

When we showed this video in church, every single gathering erupted in clapping at the end. Because the need is obvious. Enjoy!