Our formal offer was denied.
This is now our 5th ‘no’ on the same building and our 2nd rejected formal offer (the first was in 2006). It will be interesting to see where things go from here. Our highest priority is to find a great and affordable location for our church beginning in mid-September and then to sort out our longer-term plan.
This may not be the end of our building quest, but it is definitely a ‘no’ for now.
Keep praying for us!
Yesterday was my birthday! (insert cheering here) And while we are waiting to hear back from the owners of the building about our offer I have been enjoying a fantastic birthday weekend. Nichol and Susan gave me a card with this timely quotation on the front.
“There is no use trying,” said Alice; “one can’t believe impossible things.”
“I dare say you haven’t had much practice,” said the Queen. “When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.” –Lewis Carroll.
Daring to try what many call impossible.
Our Solicitor (a lawyer who writes formal offers for real estate property transactions) considers our hopes for this building “incredibly unlikely.” We are making an offer three times lower than what the owners would like. In our defense, we had a formal appraisal done on the building last week and based on that we are offering a bit more than the value of this church building if used for a church. In the unlikely event the owners are desperate to sell and against all odds accept our offer, he believes, in this current economic climate, getting a loan will be even more unlikely.
No matter how incredibly unlikely this seems we refuse to stop trying. We pray, we act, and we wait to hear back. Tomorrow our formal offer will be submitted and we hope to hear a response early next week.
Our situation requires God’s intervention followed by more of God’s intervention. It will be interesting to see how this resolves. Good thing God still hears prayers!
(photo by Jordan Phillips)
It is great to be back in Scotland with my family after being away for the past two weeks. Even though I hate being away, I enjoyed my brief time in the U.S. for Scott and Monica’s wedding in Portland. Scott is a great friend from Scotland who helped start the church here, went to Multnomah seminary and met his bride while studying in Portland. The second week found me almost two hours outside of Budapest, Hungary for a missionary conference (think central Kansas, but rural.) I had a chance to teach a workshop for a couple days and the response from it was quite… surprising. I thought the material was simple, but the range of opinions brought about a thought provoking time for all of us.
These past two days I have been reacquainting myself with what is happening with our building situation. It seems our building has not yet been surveyed and valued as it was supposed to be while I was away. The surveyor was hospitalized last week, but has rescheduled the survey and valuation for Thursday, August 13th. SO MUCH hinges on this survey. It will tell us the value of the building, the condition of the building, expected repairs in the first 5 years…things like that.
Since we have been without a church building, we have been meeting in the ally next to our old church building for our regular prayer. It has rained every Tuesday I have been in town for about a month and a half. And yet there we were last night asking God to intervene. Asking for a low valuation.
It is hard to value a church building and even professionals are not quite sure what the value is going to be. What this survey declares the value to be, this will be the official value of the building. We are praying for a LOW VALUE.
In the next 10 days, we are wanting to make an offer. This is a huge moment for us. Pray all the details come together and that, against all human expectation, the owners of the building sell it to us quickly. (I plan to write more about this next time.)
Strategic Prayer Point: Low Valuation Of The Church Building On Thursday August 13th.
We believe in a God who still hears prayers and still intervenes. I am secretly praying that somehow we will be able to worship in the building by Sunday, September 20th. We have nowhere to meet from that weekend on. Join with us in making a loud cry to heaven for a miracle in our situation. Thank you for praying.