Ron, I enjoy your writing and thinking. Keep up the good work.

I didn’t detect any Twitter connection. I know some folks that would probably like to ‘follow’ you.
Maybe someday?

Mr Trent and I have partnered on a project together in Dalton GA. Michael is a great asset to the design team. We brought him in during predesign which allowed him to assess the churches needs and to answer many of their questions you posed, about methods, size and who should run the venue and such.
Most people can’t tell you why they like spaces like coffee shops, but the team translated that into the 7 levels/types of lighting and type and placement of seating will make you want to stay or leave. Michael was a well of knowledge and understood that the real goal was to connect people in conversation and encourage ministry to happen. The church has commented on just how much ministry gets done in that space. It has been an good tool for a safe and comfortable place for the community to have first contact with the church’s ministry.

David B Dial, AIA, LEED AP

Tithing is the practice of returning to God a portion of what He’s already given to us. Scriptures says that He will bless and multiply what we bring (see Malachi 3:10), but there’s no transaction, no goods or services for cash. Buying coffee is, of course, a transaction, requiring little faith and scant blessing (apologies to coffee fanatics). I don’t see the latter as a “modernization” of the former.

I applaud the creation of environments in churches, or anywhere else for that matter, that make space for valuable interaction. These can be gymnasiums, coffee shops or playgrounds. And I don’t begrudge charging what you must to either underwrite the cost or convince someone that what’s being served is worth having.

A example of this done well off-campus is Ebenezer’s Coffee House, a ministry of National Community Church in Washington DC. The venture’s tagline is “Coffee with a Cause” and they use whatever they make to subsidize ministry in the surrounding community.

For just the reason you’ve cited, I, too, am a bit uncomfortable with the idea proposed by Trent (and executed by Ebenezer’s): that the goal of the cafe might be to underwrite ministry. Good intentions are so easy to abuse. (I’m also uncomfortable with things like yard sales for mission trips and selling CD’s in the narthex, believing that God provides for the work of the church within the church.) But I think Jesus was clearing the Temple of people that preyed on the church, not those who prayed in it, and am inclined to give properly motivated endeavors a little leeway.

Thank you for giving me the link to your blog (if though I soon after realized that it was linked to your Facebook page).

What is your own opinion on coffee shops in churches? In one respect, I have to bring up the scripture that tells the story of Jesus overturning the market tables where people were trying to sell stuff in the temple. However, I understand that the money that is made at church coffee shops does, in fact, go towards the church. So, perhaps this scripture doesn’t apply, so long as the money is being given to the church? Could this, in some ways, just be seen as a modernization of “tithing?”

Thoughts?

Kelly