The New Church Rises

Several months ago, I took some pictures of the empty lot where our new church would rise, and never published anything (or if I did, I cannot find it now). Today, my wife was enlisted to supply her painting skills at the 6400 building, which was on the one finished lot out of the four lots where Christ Church of Longboat Key - Presbyterian (official name) had set out to build our barrier islands newest house of worship. She had volunteered to help revitalize the pink building several times in the past, but today she got the call at 9 AM to come pitch in. So off to the garage to find her painting tools, which she kept even though our new condo was freshly painted three months ago, and into her little car she went. Ripley, the best photographers assistant in the beagle world, joined me later to visit and see the progress made.

The new church will seat 300, which may well be necessary come Christmas 2011 and Easter 2012. We Presbyterians are exceptionally faithful on "C & E" as some call it. This past week, attendance was just over 200 in the seats, and many of our "snowbird" associate members are still up north, stuck in the snow. Church attendance seems to swell as children and grandchildren often visit sunny Florida during the winter months, and make the perfunctory appearance with family on Sunday.

The old building was what could have been described as a "live/work" unit, but the entire three lots purchased were commercially zoned, adjacent to a single family homes neighborhood, and further east on General Harris street (where the new church will face) there is a home business (flower shop/sign shop) and the Town of Longboat Key's Public Works building and yard. The upstairs of the pink building is a three bedroom apartment, where two years ago we had Thanksgiving dinner with perhaps 50 others in the congregation. It will ultimately become the parsonage for whatever minister might follow our current retired minister. We've had two retired ministers shepherding a flock of retired pensioners, by and large. While the new building will feature a nursery in addition to the offices of the pastor, and meeting rooms downstairs, our youth movement consists mostly of 50 year old early retirees. In its most recent prior life, there were four separate small shops/office located on the lower level, where a beauty shop, an architect, and a Realtor rented space. They're gone now, and interior doors have been installed, several non-load bearing walls removed, and the inside space all connected together. A tower on the corner closest to Gulf of Mexico Drive and General Harris will identify the campus as that of a church, and ultimately the pink building will be painted the same as the church to tie them together.

Oh, I think my dear wife is inspecting her work, not looking upward to heaven to pray for the soul of her husband, thou the Lord knows I could use his help sometimes.