UPDATE FOR 8/30/2024
Happy Friday Church – 

I have news to share regarding our worship space at 320 Harris Ave. Our landlord Albert from the beginning of our lease last April has been asking me if we would consider taking over the bigger space next door. For those that don’t know, the majority of the building was used by a large church that moved into a building they purchased to own. The space we use was their youth / multi purpose room. Right next door to us was their main worship room and classrooms for kids.

The space we currently use was a huge change after being a house church during covid and making the commit to that and getting it ready to use was a big endeavorer both financially and all the people power to get it ready.

I’ve been amazed at the buy in from the church to make the space comfortable and also to help bear the financial responsibility of the new adventure we have been on. Our current space (suite G) has been a tremendous blessing since we got the keys in April. I feel like it has helped us reignite and expand our vision of how to serve and love people and also given us a location to put down some new roots that I believe will bear fruit.

In the back ground Albert has been trying to fill the building up with tenants and has been having a hard time finding someone to rent the suite next door because it is currently not configured for a traditional business. It is configured for a church. I believe that this is one of the reasons he has asked me multiple times about taking it over. Some of our leadership team looked at it originally back in March and candidly it felt like to much space and to much cost, which is why we elected to commit to Suite G. Suite G in so many ways meets and exceeds our current needs, but as we’ve settled in, we’ve realized that it does not give us room to grow. We only have one classroom for kids and the main worship space already feels cramped when we all show up on a Sunday. I won’t bore you with all the church statistics, but simply put, you often will only grow to 70-80% of your seating, which means at best in that space we could expect 60-70 people before it would feel cramped. More importantly, we only currently have space to add 4-5 more kids if everyone shows up. We really want to become a church that is comfortable for families with kiddos. Making new disciples who at a young age learn to love Jesus is a call on our church.

S0 after a few back and fourths, we have agreed to a new deal to give up our current space and move next door. We currently use 3,100 sq ft. The space next door is 7,500 sq ft. It’s double the size of our current suite, which allows us more space in the main worship room, but more importantly it gives us way more space to serve kiddos and also more space to serve the community. The new space will cost more money, but we have received favor from Albert. We get a graduated payment that goes up slowly over the rest of this year and all of next year. I’ll get more information out soon about the finances so that all of us can consider ways to meet and exceed the budget to cover extra costs, but know that our agreement gives us access to more than double the size of space without double the cost. In fact our new deal per square foot cost is substantially lower than our current lease which was already favorable.

So what are the next steps? We will be scheduling work days so we can clean, paint, decorate, and prepare the main worship areas and a couple classrooms. The goal is to use the week of October 13th to move all our stuff over so our first worship service in the new space happens on Sunday, October 20th. We will likely work Sunday afternoons and a couple nights a week in preparation. That gives us 6 weeks or so to get stuff done. I know we can rally for another painting push.

Someone this week said it’s sad to have just finished getting Suite G setup to now have to move. This is a real feeling and observation. My thought is that God used Suite G to help us launch into a new season. We may not have embraced anything if we had to tackle the bigger vision. Now, after expanding, we are better prepared to say yes to the new and bigger thing. I believe that a vibrant Vineyard church in Sacramento is God’s desire. As a small part of the body of Christ, we want to have a helpful resource to bless the local community and also have a space that can serve our Vineyard movement by hosting conferences and training. Gratefully, our decorations, classroom supplies, chairs, and sound system can all shift to the new space. We are blessed already and I believe we are being given more because God wants to use our little group to declare Jesus as King of Kings in a mighty way in the Norwood area and throughout greater Sacramento. We are currently the only Vineyard church within a 1-2 hours drive and I’d love to become a healthy church that can send out new shoots all over Sacramento and beyond. A building is not the primary key to that vision, but having a home base will help us become a community that sends new churches out to serve communities all over Sacramento and California.

Be praying for this next new season. We can ask the Holy Spirit for ways to serve and give. We can pray that neighbors who are close and further away will be drawn to become Jesus’ disciples. We can pray that people throughout the region who God wants to bring our way to help lead and serve will say yes. We can pray that as we continue to follow the leading of the Lord and say yes, that we would experience the Lord’s resources so we can be a blessing.

As I shared in a sermon a couple months ago, status quo isn’t real. If we are holding onto the status quo we will eventually see that it is dying and decaying. We must see what the Holy Spirit is up to today and follow that. I believe we are following the Holy Spirit into a new adventure and I’m inviting all o us to say yes and join in.

I understand that change can cause anxiety and produce questions. Please reach out if you’d like more information or have questions or concerns. You can call / text me @ 916-202-6251.

Blessings and see you Sunday – JZ