This past weekend, the leaders of Vineyard Community Church announced that our Church was backing away from our attempt to purchase the J.R. Ewan facility. We will elaborate more on this in the coming days here at the Forward Blog, but for now, we’ll simply post the press release regarding the situation. Stay tuned – more info to come!
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The leaders and staff of Vineyard Community Church entered the process of pursuing the former J.R. Ewan Elementary with high hopes. The prospect of inhabiting such a historical building in a beautiful neighborhood in the heart of Lexington was an incredible opportunity for our community. Our prayer was that the Fairway community would consider their neighborhood a better place as a result of our presence, and we looked forward to serving and welcoming the community with open arms.
We had no idea that the prospect of our movement into the J.R. Ewan facility would be met with such vocal and visible opposition. However, in the face of this opposition, we continued to move forward, doing our very best to build bridges between our Church and the Fairway neighborhood through open and honest dialogue. We chose to continue our pursuit for two reasons. First, we knew that not everyone in the Fairway community was against our move, despite the vocal opposition. Second, we felt a majority of the opposition was founded on rumors and misinformation about our Church and its intentions for the facility. With this in mind, we continued to move forward in our attempt to purchase J.R. Ewan.
With the Board of Adjustment hearing approaching, we are confident that our Church would be approved for its conditional use permit. But despite our confidence in this approval, we understand that an appeal of this ruling from the Fairway Neighborhood Association is almost certain. Even assuming that our case would win this appeal, it is highly unlikely that the fight against our move would end anytime soon. The neighborhood has a history of fervently protecting and fighting against anything it feels would infringe upon the sanctity of its history and heritage.
The Fairway Neighborhood presented several conditions and restrictions for our impending use of the building, many of which were approved by the Board of Adjustments staff. However, these conditions (including limits on the number and size of events, services, membership, and outreach) would prevent any Church from effectively using the building, let alone Vineyard Community Church. What has been perceived by some as an unwillingness to cooperate with the neighborhood has simply been our continued resistance to compromise the core values and mission of our Church in the face of these restrictions.
Our Church and its leaders never intended to bring about any form of contention and conflict in these matters, and while we are disappointed by the response to our Church, we sincerely regret the division this issue has caused. We are not angry or combative people, and our heart has never been to be a divisive issue among the Fairway Neighborhood and for us to push forward in the face of continued conflict would undermine the very mission of our Church – to follow Jesus as a community of faith, hope, and love. With this in mind, we feel it is best for our Church community to pull away from our attempted purchase of the J.R. Ewan facility. We feel it would be a disservice to both our Church and the Fairway neighborhood to continue to pour our time, energy, and resources into the continuing legal dispute. As a Church, we don’t have the budget nor the sufficient funds to sustain this ongoing litigation.
Please understand that we are not angry or against the Fairway neighborhood. We hope for only the best for what we’ve come to know as a beautiful and historic community. Our prayer throughout this journey has been to display that followers of Christ aren’t angry and combative in the face of adversity. We hope that our city has seen that our posture throughout has never been about what we are against, but instead what we are for – faith, hope, and love. We look forward to wherever God leads our community next, and trust that He has even better things ahead for Vineyard Community Church, as we look forward to loving and serving our city for years to come.
In light of the current controversy over the ground zero mosque plan, I find your message of Christian forgiveness and humility refreshing, timely, and exemplary. Rather than creating a volatile atmosphere and forcing a ” legal right” showdown, you took the high road of lowliness to show the Trueness of Christ, love is greater than being right! I applaud you for your decision and I know that God will honor your obedience to principle.
With your permission, I would like to share your story with others, including a friend of mine who hosts a radio show in Fla. I won’t use any names or personal info, just the example of how Christians handle situations like yours.
God bless you, Kingdom praises,
Larry McNabb
Somerset, Ky
sure!