Would you agree to sell your church (building) to allow more money to be used for those less fortunate?

At a time where everyone is feeling the tough economic constraints, one pastor is considering a huge change that challenges the way that many people view church.  He's planning to sell the bricks and mortar in order to fund more outreach through his congregation. With over half of his budget going towards the building itself, he believes that it's a good idea. 

What would you think if your Pastor got up one Sunday and told you that he is selling the building so; you could do more community outreach??  Would your mouth drop in disbelief or would you shout Amen?? 


See story below taken from AJC\Christopher Quinn
"At Rolling Hills Baptist Church in Fayetteville, the pastor is trying to sell the building from under his congregation.

“Our motive should not be to fill these seats, but to empty these seats,” the Rev. Frank Mercer decided last year.

In a metro area known for megachurches, prosperity preachers and church-owned sports fields, Rolling Hills, which has 100 congregants, has joined a national movement that is challenging the very idea of what makes a church.

In this time of economic famine, Rolling Hills wants to lose the mortgage, air-conditioning bills and insurance costs and move members off the pews so they could do more work in their community, in downtown Atlanta, and in Mexico and Honduras.

In Fayetteville, it is an exciting and frightening move for Mercer, who came here five years ago from a Charlotte megachurch with a staff of 20 pastors.

His hope was to build Rolling Hills into a similar institution, but his ideas — and those of his congregation — began to change last year, when they visited a church in New York City.

That church rented space, but was thinking about buying a building— a pricey consideration. One member of that congregation wondered if the church could afford to continue programs, such as feeding the hungry, if it bought a building.

He spoke a phrase that became a mantra for his church: “I’m afraid if we become a church of bricks and mortar, we’ll cease to be a church of flesh and blood.”

“We spend over 50 percent of our budget on a building that we are in less than 10 percent of the time,” Mercer said.

Lebby, Mercer and others began talking about changing that.

More than 800 churches nationally participate in “Faith in Action” Sunday during October, when members fan out in their communities doing good rather than going to services.

“It’s easy to do a ‘don’t go to church’ day. But to sell your buildings and change the way you worship is a pretty radical step for a church,” Fredrickson said.

After that trip to New York, Mercer returned home and began preaching a series on why the church exists — to serve others.

Members became more active, serving in a homeless shelter, working with children at the Baptist Children’s Home and performing community service projects on Mondays.

They also began seriously pondering the idea of selling the church property.

Once the building is sold, the church may look for a general-purpose building to rent, where congregants can meet for services, store clothes to be given to their foreign-missions projects or use for community programs.

“I came out of a megachurch in Charlotte with the idea that this church was broken and needed to be fixed,” Mercer said. “I have not saved this little church. It has saved me.

“I guess I am the one that needed to be fixed.”"