God At Work: Our Sanctuary Rebuild Project
You’ve probably seen the God At Work sign in front of our sanctuary, or have heard that we are currently worshipping in a gymnasium, we want to provide a full history and share all of our updates to this point.
Where we came from
In 2016, the roof of our sanctuary began to deteriorate. We had recently installed solar panels and the walls began bowing causing structural damage. We quickly moved worship to our Family Life Center and began connecting with engineers and contractors to determine the strength of our roof. As soon as we started, we began to run into problems, the insulation of our sanctuary was all asbestos and a remediation project was started to clear the old insulation. Finally, we were able to see the full extent of the damage and realized the sanctuary could not be recovered.
Financially, this meant a few specific things for the church, the remediation work, rental of scaffolding, and engineering in addition to other expenses immediately cost the church over $475,000, an amount of money that we were unprepared for. You can find the Summary of Expenditures here: https://marltonumc.com/s/MUMC-GodAtWork-Expenditures-Summary-thru-12-31-20.pdf
We were faced with a lack of funds and increased our mortgage to cover these costs and began a new capital campaign, titled God at Work to pay off this amount and prepare us for the future.
Where we are
Fast forward to 2021, the God at Work campaign has been a resounding success, and Marlton United Methodist Church is virtually debt-free having raised funds to pay off the mortgage and expenses associated with the structural damage initially discovered. We have also continued to worship God and serve the community throughout these past few years while we are preparing and dreaming of how we can answer God’s call to build disciples of Jesus for the transformation of the world.
Where we are Going
With such an outpouring of generosity and love from the community and congregation, Marlton United Methodist Church is poised to begin a brand new chapter in our history. We have formed a new team of people who are dedicated to dreaming and rebuilding our sanctuary for the future of Marlton UMC and the community. We’ll continue to provide updates and our plans and our dreams while we begin this journey together.
If you’d like to get involved, there are three main ways we are asking for your help:
Pray for Marlton UMC, the community, and the congregation as we are going through such a big undertaking.
Contact us if you have any comments, hopes, or dreams that you would like to share.
Continue to give generously as you have been. All donations to the capital campaign will continue to position us for the future.
Sanctuary Rebuild Team Updates
