Church Family,
Last Tuesday morning, Cedar Heights received a building fund check for $200,000. This donation, in conjunction with the $500,000 we received last August, provided the needed funds to officially pay off our building loan. Today, I am happy to report that the educational building is ours.
Over the last 15+ years, many of you have shouldered the virtuous responsibility of paying for the educational building. Today, I and many others are the benefactors of your gracious and patient dedication. And now, because of your obedience to God's leading, we can rejoice at being debt free.
As we celebrate, I’d like to encourage the church body with three important thoughts:
First, though our building is paid off, and we are debt free, that does not mean the ministry is done. So, at the risk of sounding like a snake oil salesman or a shady car dealer, my encouragement to you is to continue tithing. We have not finished the gospel work here at Cedar Heights. We still have much work to do. Now that the building is paid off, we can focus on much needed upkeep, renovations, repairs, ministries, and kingdom work.
Which leads me to my second encouragement, we must be thoughtful, wise, strategic, and prayerful in how we arrange our freed finances. Paying off the building essentially frees about $12,000 a month. That’s not to say we have to maintain the same budget (that’s for the church body to decide), but we must think with a kingdom mindset, think long-term, and think wisely. In my 20+ years of ministry, I have never been in this financial situation. Such a position comes with its own set of leadership challenges, and they are challenges we are ready to undertake. We must do so, however, with much care and thoughtfulness. We must walk the narrow path between being a financial miser and a financial fool.
Lastly, though we certainly have much needed repairs and updates to our own campus, my encouragement is that we not ignore the kingdom, outward call of the gospel. Yes, we must use some freed resources to fix up our church infrastructure; however, we must not be so inwardly focused that we forget the mission God has called us to. We must also consider opportunities of kingdom advancement outside these four walls.
With that, I say: Well done, Cedar Heights! But most of all I say: Praise the Lord who is bountiful in His blessings and gracious in His countenance toward us.
Pastor Chad