Presentation of the architect February 15, 2009: What does the new sanctuary symbolize?

I want to invite someone very special who is with us, and it is the architect Glenn Knowles and give a big round of applause for our architect Glenn. And Glenn is with his daughter Alexandra here today and Glenn is a miracle for this congregation because God brought him to me as he has always brought so many things, when we started this campaign, or when we started this idea that the Lord put in me years ago, I I said, Lord, you are going to have to find a generous, Christian architect who is committed and of good quality. And Glenn God brought him, he practically put him in front of me. I don't have time to let you know what Dio did. And Glenn has taken this project with such a generous heart, saved us hundreds of thousands of dollars and given so generously, brethren, that I can't thank him enough.

And if God has been providing that way, brethren, parting the Red Sea continually, He's going to part the sea yet before us. I want to ask Glenn to come in here.

And Glenn is going to give them a presentation. A round of applause for him, brothers, a round of applause. You know what we forgot in all the hustle and bustle, what part of -it's happened easy girl, is that you're so revved up I'm the one who assumes you're revved up, thanks Patty. And, please if one of the musicians can come here to lubricate this time and have someone be there, and Lucia please -but I want to introduce you, Glenn is going to give us a little presentation of what this Shrine symbolizes. And what are the parts of this Sanctuary. And this Sanctuary has a symbolic value. It's an expression of many things so Glenn, welcome.

If you can get us another microphone please. Where are the microphones, quick. Thank you. Thank you so much.

I'm a little nervous. I want to thank you for the invitation and be part of this celebration. I attend the Cambridge church, which is a Baptist church, across the river, but I feel like this is my church too.

We are brothers and sisters and I cannot really put into words what an honor and privilege it is to work with Pastor Roberto and you to serve the Lord together. León de Judá Congregation has been a tremendous blessing to me and my family.

And now I am going to briefly describe to you what the new sanctuary is, the new temple. This is the front of the temple, the front of the temple that will face Reed Street, where you enter the parking lot, facing that street.

I'm going to try to show you here, I'm a little nervous as I say.

As you can see there are three sections vertically looking, there is a red base here or reddish. In the middle there is an intermediate part of brick of another color. And the upper part, the upper part is three sections, one, two and three, middle and top and bottom. At the base the main material is brick. And as you know the brick is made of mud that comes out of the ground. And when I designed time for you, I wanted the base to represent life in nature, natural life - human, biological.

And in the upper part, the final part at the top, the main material is metal. And that metal reflects light, it's reflective. And for me that upper part, metallic, that reflects the light represents the spiritual realm just as the lower part represents the natural human part. And the middle section is a combination because it contains brick. But the brick is in that part it is pulling towards the color, the tone of the metal is a higher color and therefore the part in the middle represents for me the spiritual part, the part of the Christian believer, our Christian life.

That is why it is in the middle part between the lower or terrestrial part and the upper part, which is the already celestial part, right? In the middle of our Christian life is our Christian spiritual experience. And that is the description that you can see in the vertical form looking from the bottom up on the façade.

Now also going horizontally to the side, left to right, right to left, it's hard to see it here in this design but you'll see it on the actual building, there's a line going down, if you can see it next to the small windows, there is a vertical line. And the line starts up, up there and goes down, continuously down. And it ends there at the natural level, doesn't it? From the upper one and there it stops more or less. And this represents to me the incarnation of Jesus Christ, Jesus Christ descending from heaven and coming down to earth. Jesus has descended to earth.

And now continuing horizontally from that line that I have described that descends and revives the incarnation continuing to the right, from left to right. After that incarnation of Christ, that section here in the middle going to the right represents the life and ministry of Jesus Christ, that is, this is the story of Jesus. There are three sections, three years of ministries; This also represents the life of the Christian, of the believer.

Here on the front of this building, you're going to see perforated metal panels, and those panels are going to be at different angles to each other, relative to each other. And that's so that when a person walking towards the building approaches it from different angles they're going to have different experiences of the play of light hitting the building when they approach the building when looking up at it. This will represent the dynamic aspect of the spiritual life that changes there are days, there are trips, there are difficulties and different processes that occur; sometimes things will not be clear to the believer on his journey but when one lines up with the panels and looks directly at them one can see things quite clearly aligning with God.

And also at night, at night that panel that is a little larger during the day, the light does not enter so easily, but at night the light that comes from inside will allow you to see inside very easily, towards the front because the game of light with the panels will allow you to see better inside.

As you know, after the ministry of Jesus, when his ministry ended, you will remember that of course, it culminated at the end of his ministry on the cross that is here on the façade. And on the other side of the cross when one goes from here to there, incarnation, journey of Jesus and journey of the believer, then there is also the cross, and on the other side of the cross represents the reconciliation that occurred as a result of the cross between man, humanity and God, the Father. And that is represented by the glass, by that structure here that is transparent and that reflects that reconciliation, that light, that transparency. So the whole facade of the building represents the life of Jesus.

That is, to enter that building and penetrate through that façade, one will always have to be passing through Jesus and all his ministry and his life, one must pass through Jesus to enter the sanctuary and be able to adore the Father.

So very quickly, these are the so themed plans of the building only. The first floor is going to be primarily parking what may be left of the building, parking right here where we are, there will be basic parking. So the second floor will be the main sanctuary. It will be ascended by stairs or by elevator for people with disabilities. And there's a connector that's going to connect to this building, the New Sanctuary. The third level is a balcony that goes all the way around and that level will also see another connection with this building, it will be possible to enter this building from that sanctuary through two different levels. The fourth floor is an additional space for more classrooms and offices, and there will also be a large meeting room space there, also additional here on the top floor.

And this is computing performance. This is rather generic but it more or less symbolizes what the interior of the sanctuary will be like, there will not necessarily be benches but you have an idea more or less through a computer how it would feel to be inside that space. Don't let the pews fool you, because it won't be pews, it will be modern seating like ours - it's actually going to be a modern sanctuary like this, but much larger, the whole balcony and everything else, but it's kind of like an idea. is.

And the purpose of these studies through computing so that, above all, it would allow us to study this acoustic ceiling that is going to be placed in the sanctuary. It's a specially constructed ceiling to help improve sound within the worship space and everything else, it's wood paneling that's going to be very beautiful.

They are panels that undulate, it is a very… they are placed at different levels and produce an effect of more like a wave. ripples.

I am going to talk briefly about the bricks, these bricks that will be used inscribed. This is a drawing that shows the entrance that goes between the building that is going to be built and the current sanctuary where you are sitting, go through there, people can go from one side to the other between the two buildings. For there back and forth, people can pass back and forth between the two buildings.

Down there in that space where the current entrance goes, right now, what we have behind there you are looking at here now, this is the current sanctuary- sorry the new sanctuary here, this is the back of our building when you enter, Imagine the cars enter here like this now and you enter here. Well, when this building is up here there's going to be a space there in the middle underneath where people will be able to walk as well one of the possible locations for those inscribed bricks. There in that part, between the two buildings or through the walkway that's going to be here, when you enter… And potentially up in one of the spaces above, from the connector on one of the upper floors, possibly they could be put there as well.

This is more or less the type of how they would look, they are inscribed like this with a laser beam and they are very resistant bricks, made exclusively for the street and to resist the elements and last a long time, because we do not want the name to be erased later and come to complain to me

And remember that the bricks will be one of the last things that we are going to install

Thank you so much.

And let's give a big round of applause to this man who deserves it. Give it real strong.

Samuel, let me have my Bible, brother. Yes please remember, these are not bricks okay, these are just symbolic. Every person who makes a promise today, who makes a promise, will be given one of these bricks. These are special bricks that will be made once progress has been made in this process, so those bricks will be made specifically to comply with that part. But, these bricks you can take today as a reminder. And remember brothers, we want to encourage you to give something very, very special. And time is gone, but I want to encourage you in the name of the Lord to prepare your hearts. And all I want to do is quickly provide you, already preparing to give to the Lord, a couple more items.

The title of our campaign has been a faith promise, hitting the discomfort zone. With the widow of Sarepta as our motto.

I want you to remember, brothers, the vision of this campaign, it is a sanctuary for the Glory of God, not just brick, but to glorify the Lord.

It is to build a large and beautiful place for an expanded Lion of Judah.

And... remember that we cannot continue growing until the Lord expands the place and you participate in that miracle, what we are doing is a larger Sanctuary for a spiritually and ministerially expanded Lion of Judah, we want a place for the coming revival . We have said that the Lion of Judah will be a place of revival.

And also a refuge for the transformation of lives.

Now we have a specific need, we need a Shrine that allows us to grow.

Because we are also constrained by legal requirements to build now, and many people wonder why now? During this time. Why not leave it for two years, three years. There are legal requirements that push us to build at this time and we don't have time to describe it but we have obligations to city agencies that have given us limited time. The clock is already ticking and unfortunately either we do it now or we close the door to construction in the future.

Now I have told you about a vision of a need, I want to talk about a disadvantage at this time, interestingly, ironically this is the best time to build.

If the financial parts of the sanctuary fall into place both this financial campaign and the loan we are working on with the banks, this would be the best time to build. Because? Because today interest rates are lower than ever before.

Second, the cost of materials has dropped dramatically.

And the contractors are also more flexible, because there is not much work, there is not much construction, there are not many people of faith, crazy like us, who are building at this time.

And what is the methodology we want to use. I'm just giving you a couple of examples, right? Look brothers, if you look at it in 3 years, 156 weeks, 36 months and you break, break that number into weeks, you can see that it is not as outrageous as it might seem. For example, if a person decides, you know what, I'm going to give the man $20 a week, that's what I spend on cappuccinos, only that it's making me fat and clothes don't even work for me anymore. And then I have to buy more clothes and I get depressed and this and that. You know not to get depressed, young lady, ma'am, give it to the lord. If you give $20 a week, that's $1,040 a year. And if you establish a purpose in the name of Jesus in three years you can give the Lord three thousand and some dollars, if you give $30 a week, that's $1,500 a year, do the math. It's $4,700 and something, almost $4,800 in three years. And if you give the Lord $40 a week, that's what you spend when you go to the North End to eat an Italian meal, it's almost $2,100 a year, which is $6,000 and odds a year, I beg you don't be intimidated .

Brothers, this is so that we stop thinking like poor people, make room in your store.

The values that are going to govern this campaign, I want you to remember that each of you has something, no one please say, 'I can't.' Think of three years and think that we can all give something.

Make a faith promise, make a faith promise, think that God can bless you, don't think about the moment, think about how God can bless me in the future, and above all what we call in the area of discomfort, where it gets hard Remember the widow from Zarephath that we talked about earlier.

The loan is linked to the total amount of the pledges. We need the closest to that million and a half that we have said. We need it because the loan will depend on the promises that are made today and next Sunday, which we also want but it will not be like this, but we do want to resume this as well.

Remember, don't say, "oh, I'm going to wait and see," you have to help, and help now and give us even a promise and think about when you can give it because otherwise the campaign is affected. That is why it is so important.

Don't be modest, don't be conservative, don't be more humble than the Lord. The Lord says, He likes promises, commitments, the move of faith and remember that you have three years to give. There is a promise that the Lord gives. There are three texts that we have discussed these days. The text of the widow of Sarepta, give me first says the prophet Elijah and you will not lack.

The second text was from Haggai, where God tells the Hebrew people, build my house and I will bless you.

And the third text is from Second Chronicles, of King Jehoshaphat, when the King tells his people, 'believe the prophets of God and you will prosper'.

And this, as I have said, I am doing in a prophetic capacity because I believe that God truly wants this to be built. So there you have it. Let's end here, I had many more things to give you. But I want to encourage you now. And please if we can stand up for a moment, let's pray to the Lord. And we are going to ask the Lord to bless us greatly and that his grace be with us as we give to the Lord in an extraordinary way.

We ask, Lord, that you give your people a spirit of generosity and joy in giving you this day. We adore you and we bless you, Lord, and we give you many, many thanks in Jesus' name. Amen and amen.

I want to encourage you my brothers, I know that many of you have already made a promise before, and we invite you now to come up here to all those who have said, “hey, I already made my promise,” and we are going to do it in an orderly manner and what we want to ask you is to wait a moment. You can come here, and Patty help me if you have any ideas to expedite this and it's good that some of me are already fighting to come, that's a great blessing.

But we are going to take this time and then you are going to come here, you are going to write your name. There are two seasons here, right? There are four places where you can, two here and two here, sign your name, bring your card and put it in one of the baskets here and then you can go back to your seat and maybe you want to keep praying for a little while or you can be fired inside in a minute. moment.

Brothers, we want to remind you that this is the time for you to fill out your card; Remember, brothers, that if you do not have your money, we do not expect you to have it today, but the most important thing is that you fill out your cards and let us know today that amount that the Lord has placed in your hearts. So the most important thing is that you leave us your cards. Let us know your intention, your promise, today, is the most important thing. If you have any doubts, there are men and women here, from the deacons.

We are in the new building near the exits. But, my brothers, the people who gave their pre-pledgers, the people who have signed up beforehand. We ask that you also come when they start. So in the name of God we will. Amen, amen.

Give the Lord a big round of applause. And we're going to start moving forward here, and we're going to give it generously. Put your signature quickly and then you can come back. if you have any questions see any of the people who will be there...

Take your brick, don't leave without your brick, and pray for that brick so that the Lord greatly blesses this effort and no one leaves without giving the Lord a generous promise of faith. And any questions we will be available to answer them.

Glory to God.