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From Rev. Brock Patterson
“We Love This Chapel!”
What’s that? Who’s this? Why don’t I know everyone here? Do those questions sound familiar to you? These are common questions around the Chapel and I love it! Why? Because these questions indicate growth in a church, plain and simple. They’re the recognition that great things are happening.
When an organization experiences growth, we begin to learn lots of new things. Among them, we learn that new people mean new ideas. We learn about needs we didn’t know existed and we learn that we’re much more capable of making a difference than we might have otherwise thought. We also learn very quickly about our facilities, because more people mean more lights, air conditioning, office space, and of course, toilet flushes.
Haha! Were you waiting for that last reference to the toilet? If you’ve been around the Chapel for the last month, then you already know: We must fix the plumbing in our main common areas. It has served us well since 1963 but the time has arrived to fix it.
In order to fix it, we’ll need to drill through the floors and dig the lines that connect to the main sewer lines at Gulf of Mexico Drive. This work is absolutely necessary, following two years of hard work by a few dedicated volunteers who devoted much time to try to remedy the issues. Band-aids won’t work anymore. We must do it right. And, since we’re doing all of this work, we’ve also decided to renovate our staff office space (the areas are connected) and open the Sanctuary Lobby (Narthex) to allow better flow of foot traffic.
We anticipate beginning the work as early as June 1, 2024, and our intent is to be completed by December 1, 2024. Yes, that’s cutting it close to Christmas (and the Season), but I’m sure you’ll agree that this timing is the best option, for sure.
This upcoming Sunday, April 7, 2024, we will host a churchwide meeting following worship. The meeting will be to explore the anticipated construction and answer everyone’s questions. The meeting will be streamed (on the website) and the link is enclosed in this Chapeline. If you are among those who will be watching the meeting from offsite, you will be able to email and text questions live (instructions are in this Chapeline) and we will do our best to get all of them answered during the meeting. Everyone is invited to attend.
I know; this is a long letter. I’m so thankful to be at the Chapel. I think you are thankful, as well. God is doing some beautiful work. There are Lots of smiles! Lots of needs are being filled. Lots more is coming, and this renovation project will go a long way to help us continue doing God’s work in the communities we serve.
If you have questions or concerns, you are always welcome to contact me. I’m here because of you and God’s work in all of us.
We love this Chapel!
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