New Development *Updated*

1/28/09 -- Last night I talked to Larry and it looks like we're moving ahead with the boxes. I am setting up an appointment for next week to go look at the carts. (Larry was appointed to help with the cart project at our members meeting.) I took measurements yesterday, and think they'll fit no problem. He and I are going to try and pick them up next week.

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As a mobile church we have come face to face with the blessings and curses of being a church in the middle of the marketplace. It is a huge blessing financially to steward our resources in a way that rents more than enough space for much less than any type of purchase or lease. We meet in a beautiful location that would cost millions to replace. People who are far from God find the location less intimidating than a traditional church building. So we're glad to be the church at the college. After all, it takes all kinds of churches to reach all kinds of people.

The curses are manifested in the setup/teardown week after week. Since we started the church there have been different phases that we've been through: everyone do everything, each on do something, limited people doing specific things, and (I think Rob can attest to) one person doing everything. We've setup on Sunday mornings, and we've setup on Saturday nights. We've had varying degrees of involvement. It ebbs and flows as sometimes we have more than enough people, contrasted by the times when we don't have enough.

We do have one recent change in our system that has made a big difference. We added a Large Metal cart on heavy duty wheels with a cage that carries our entire sound system (every piece). It limits the number of trips between the trailer and lecture hall to one, and delivers reliable transportation for our equipment. In fact, since we implemented this castoff from another church we have been on the lookout for more. Today, I found three more available. They are identical to the ones we have and though they retail for more than $800.00 a piece new, we are able to pick up three for less than $150.00 a piece. We have to take some measurements to make sure they'll all fit in the trailer, but that would enable us to put everything in the trailer into boxes on wheels. I'll keep you updated and if we're able to use them I'll be happy to post pictures of them in the trailer.

--Ben