JUST A BUILDING...AND... MORE THAN A BUILDING

This is just a building

And…

This is so much more than a building

 

This is one man’s vision

This is a miracle before our eyes

This is the Kingdom coming

This is out of the bright blue skies

This is our prayers being answered 

This is the heavens rent in two

This is a place of learning

This is the future peeking through

This is the changing of lives

This is a generous grace 

This is blessings coming back 

This is the redemption of space

This is communities transformed

This is the good news sent

This is God in the midst of us

This is what Jesus meant

This is building hope for a nation

This is just the beginning

This is injustice hammered down

This is the least of these - winning

This is all that we believe in

This is all the words we sing

This is all my tears of joy

This is the most beautiful thing.

 

This is just a building

And…

This is so much more than a building.

A couple of years ago my Church, Fitzroy, embarked on a building project to restore and extend the halls around our Church. At a Fields Of Life event I came to a sudden realisation that if we tithed our building costs we could build a school in Africa. Fitzroy, having done such a tithing exercise in the past, quickly agreed and we became partners with the people of Onialeku, just outside Arua in north west Uganda. In the end, not by any design, we worked through Fields Of Life. 

This poem is what seeing that building that we funded expressed to me, deep in my heart, soul and mind.

This Sunday night (October 4th 2015) I will be sharing the story, people and context of our building in Onialeku as well as our own new halls that we moved into this very week and another building, The Belfast School of Music Building on Donegal Pass, that we have suddenly realised belongs to us.

They are just buildings... but they are much more than buildings.