Since Jerry Schmidt’s article about our study for the use of the chapel appeared I have been asked some very unusual questions. No we’re not closing down the chapel. No we’re not “defrocking” the chapel (I’m not even sure what that means). Defrocking refers to a priest being dismissed (removed from his job) as a priest, usually because of bad behavior or breaking church law. No we don’t have to have the Bishop here to “desanctify” the chapel. We are, in fact, suggesting that we use the chapel in greater ways to accomplish the mission of the church to make disciples.
I know questions about the use of the chapel have gone on here for many years, too many years. I know the chapel has great historical significance to our beginnings as a congregation. I know the chapel is a great place to worship and I have tried to use it as much as I could especially during our special seasons. We still get requests for the chapel for small weddings and funeral services. I greatly enjoy using the chapel for such services and I have promised to protect the integrity of the chapel.
Now, why have we come to this point of wanting to study the use of the chapel? Our Hospitality Team and Evangelism Team have found that very few of our Sunday morning visitors find their way downstairs to Hudspeth Hall following worship on Sunday morning. This means most of our Sunday morning visitors are leaving without making any kind of connection to members of our congregation or received any kind of invitation to a Sunday school class. This also means that our Hospitality Team who has committed “connecting” our visitors to our members (so the name Café Connect) feel that their work of evangelism is going undone.
It is our thought that we would more easily get our visitors to step into the chapel (an invitation at the end of the service to our visitors to come and share our roots and beginnings as they fellowship with the congregation would be something I would welcome). We need to pay attention to the adjectives the Bishop uses in the Five Practices of Fruitful Congregations. It is RADICAL hospitality which means we need to be prepared to make radical changes to make it happen. However, I see a simple change that can make a radical difference and it is this: If we were to replace the screwed down immovable pews with nice upholstered chairs similar to the ones purchased for the contemporary service and the Contemporary Sunday school class. This way we could open up the room for fellowship and evangelism (which is just as important part of our ministry as worship) and then we could easily reconfigure the room by moving the chairs for worship and services.
We now have a Chapel Study Task Team who is looking beyond even these uses. They are encouraging the congregation to get creative and help them do some brain-storming about other ways we may use the chapel area as a part of our ministry and mission. It is too great a part of our church to sit there unused. Please give it prayerful thought—is it about protecting what we have or is it about working at building relationships with each other and with the Lord?


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