This will be an opportunity to hear from an experienced consultant in the Third Place/café arena and also to see the newly completed facility at Moraine Valley Church.  Also on hand will be the café staff from MVC—to answer questions and serve you some great coffee!

Call 815-806-1705 or e-mail kruther@aspengroup.com today to sign up for this event!  You can also download the postcard for the event at the Downloads section of this blog.

See the Photo Gallery and the Moraine Valley Opens Café post on this blog for information on the MVC project.

LaGrange Bible is located in an "inner ring" suburb in Chicagoland with limited real estate availability.  Faced with a desire to reach out to the neighborhood youth while also accommodating the elderly, the church partnered with Aspen to renovate and add to their existing facility within a tight site footprint.  As you can see from the "before and after" pix below, we also gave the place a bit of a facelift as well!

Check out additional pix in the Photo Gallery! 

Rex references three great "must read" books on the Digital Age subject, The World is Flat, The Long Tail and his Millenium Matrix.  I can vouch that all three are worth the time.

Those attending the WFX conference this week will get to hear Rex keynote on Thursday.  And please feel free to stop by the Aspen/CKN booth -- we'll be serving free gourmet coffee served by our CKN partner, Michael Trent of Third Place Consulting!

Hope to see you there... 

One of the best parts of the conference was seeing some friends and clients from “back home” such as Tim Harlow, Bill Brown and several others from Parkview Christian; Jerry McQuay of Christian Life Center, Jeff Robinson of Lincolnway Christian Church, Jul Medenblik of New Life Church, Lance Hurley of CDEA, Brad Leeper from Generis and others.  And as always, it’s great to hang out with our good friend, Bill Couchenour of Cogun, our partner in Cornerstone Knowledge Network.

Having just read “The Shaping of Things to Come” (see post below), I was primed to hear what Alan Hirsch had to say.  Among my many notes:

• The root word of mission is “sent”
• The Contemporary Church Growth Model appeals to at most 40% of the U.S. population (in Australia, where Alan’s from, it’s more like 15%) – you must become missional if you want to reach the other 60% i.e. act like a missionary would when taking the gospel to a foreign culture. America is becoming a foreign culture' we can't rely on the Judeo-Christian ethic as universally understood or embraced e.g. Europe is almost entirely post-Christian
  
• “Hell is the only place you can be safe from the disturbances of love” – C.S. Lewis.  Risking enough to truly love is a biblical imperative
• China went from 2 million to over 120 million Christians in 60 years without church buildings!
  
• The primary confession of the church should be “Jesus is my Lord and I cling to Him”.  Everything the church does must be calibrated back to Jesus.
  
• Consumerism is the alternate religion of our society.  It’s too easy for churches to play into this.

Andy Stanley had some great stuff on vision.  It had been awhile since I read his “Visioneering” so it was a good refresher:

• State it Simply (memorable is portable)
• Cast it Convincingly (Define the Problem, Offer a Solution, Explain Why and Why Now)
• Repeat it Regularly
• Celebrate it Systematically
• Embrace it Personally and Publicly

One more comment about the CCC team – the “co-emcee” was Eric Bramlett, their arts director.  Eric is one funny and creative dude. Speaking of that, you might enjoy the “Dude” series they played at the conference below:

"Strategy is all about commitment. If what you're doing isn't irrevocable, then you don't have a strategy--because anyone can do it...I've always wanted to treat life like I was an invading army and there was no turning back." -- Troy Tyler

Compelling... 

Today our Frankfort Office celebrated the completion of the Moraine Valley Church project in Palos Heights, IL. Check out the pictures of the team enjoying the new café and other exciting spaces at MVC (in the Photo Gallery).  Other pictures of the completed facility were highlighted in a previous post and are still in the Gallery.

I know I speak for the whole Aspen team in expressing our feelings of thankfulness to be part of such projects like Moraine.  Special thanks to the MVC folks who opened the facility for us today – and especially our baristas Barb and Gail who served us some fabulous coffee drinks!

Great Job Team! 

I’m always encouraged when I get to visit construction sites.  The physical manifestation of all the months of planning and design is so evident – and exciting!  And I’m likewise heartened whenever I get to connect with our fine cadre of field construction managers.  This particular job is being run by Kent Barber. 

Faith Lutheran was formed when two churches merged.  They have sold their respective buildings and are relocating to a fantastic site at the corner of Eola and Liberty in Aurora, IL.  Aspen was privileged to partner with them in 2007 to help with a re-design that got their building project on budget and “in the ground” last fall.  It’s been a tough, long winter – according to Kent, the worst he’s seen in his tenure as a field manager – but as the pictures testify, the building is flying out of the ground now!

The responses are fascinating. Often the first one is shock followed by denial and frustration (so, are we supposed to build cathedrals now?). Then more careful pondering gets one thinking about things like inspiration, authenticity, and an acceptance that in fact, they really did respond this way. The survey was of the “unchurched”, not we the “churched”. And while it likely will not lead us to the conclusion that the answer is to design cathedrals—there is, after all, something suspect about grounding such a decision on an opinion survey—it must lead to us digging deeper to understand the message here.

Some of the comments I’ve picked up from the internal buzz here at Aspen follow:

* “Cutting edge stuff! I think this will be valuable information for us all to have as we partner with churches in navigating this peculiar culture.”

* “All doubt aside, I am excited to discuss where the unchurched hang out and why. For those of you that were at our last Search to Belong discussion this ties right into the Architecture of Belonging dialogue. I strongly believe churches need to be more intentional about creating nooks for personal and intimate conversations. I also believe we are uniquely positioned to educate leadership on this topic.”

* “I find it tremendously interesting that the space the unchurched prefer to meet with a friend stands in stark contrast to the church building design preferences they expressed. It makes me wonder if it isn’t the architecture they desire, but rather something of significant meaning. There is a permanence, reverence, and meaning to a cathedral’s design. It signifies something greater than ourselves. The fact that the unchurched are drawn to these qualities only highlights the fact that there is a God sized void created in each of us.”

* “What does Panera and a gothic cathedral have in common? From the research it’s obvious we love them both, yet they seem in stark contrast to one another. Or do they? The environment at Panera makes conversation and connection easy (as does soup in a bread bowl). But the physical structure is temporary – easy come, easy go. On the other hand, the cathedral is permanent – an icon that reminds me of a God that is larger than me. The Alpha and Omega. What incredible possibilities to merge the two together. Transcendent structure; cozy connection space.”

* “I think that these respondents were simply drawn to the inspirational shape and forms the traditional church represents, more so than the deeper “traditional” representation of the design. I wonder whether a modern design with “traditional” forms, or a more grandiose modern design with transcendence would not provoke the same response. I also feel like as a designer, we are set up for failure if we pay too much attention to the studies such as this that take a series of general pictures (the picture itself even plays into it) and allow for a general like or dislike.”

And on it goes…your thoughts?