Dear Stony Plain Alliance Church family,
We all have seasons in our lives when we pause to reflect on the road travelled and then use those reflections to consider the future. June is one of those seasons in the life of this church as we end our fiscal year at the end of the month and step into the new year that is before us. One of the environments where this ‘look back-look forward’ dynamic occurs for this community is at our Annual General Meeting that we call Converge which happened on June 18. For this letter, I want to share with you a reflection from this past year and a new thing that has happened regarding our finances that has a direct impact on our future.
Some context first. We have been blessed with a beautiful and functional building that many of you contributed to seeing built after our gathering place on 53rd Ave in Stony Plain was lost to a fire over 7 years ago. After many years of mortgage free ministry, we needed to secure funding for the new build which we received from the Western Canadian District (WCD). The WCD is the group that oversees the 144 Alliance churches in Alberta. When the loan agreement was signed there were many things that were unknown to anyone that ended up having significant impact on our ability as a church to service that loan. A pandemic, leadership transitions, spiking interest rates, and rapidly rising inflation, were impossible to predict fully and what has actually occurred has surpassed the thresholds of any contingency plans that were put in place.
All of these factors contributed to a financial situation that you see in our ‘SPAC in 60’ newsletter or each Sunday in our response time. In practical terms, we have been sending the WCD approximately $30,000/month to service the loans we have with them. This meant that our yearly budget needed to be around 1.3 million dollars in order to meet the fixed costs of what it takes for this ministry to function. With this size of budget, we were going to be over $200,000 short and our cash flow position would continue to be a concern.
With all of this before us, we began negotiations with the WCD a few months ago to look strategically at ways to adjust the payments in servicing the loan in a way that is affordable for this congregation. The good news is that the day before Converge we agreed to a plan that will see our monthly payments drop from $30,000/month to $10,250/month. This means that we can adjust our budget from 1.3 million to 1.1 million for this new fiscal year starting July 1. This puts us within range of what this congregation contributes to SPAC each year and helps us rebuild some financial health in the years to come.
First, we thank God for his generosity to us. He is the first giver and, in Christ, shows us what it looks like to live in an open-hearted and open-handed way. Second, thank-you to each of you for your financial support of this ministry. For this congregation to give over a million dollars each year is something that regularly astounds me. We are seeing people find fullness of life in Jesus due in part to your faithful giving. Third, we are grateful for our relationship with the WCD and their willingness to work with us in good faith as we continue to be partners in ministry.
Looking back, I am filled with gratitude for God’s faithfulness in this last year and for your contributions to this ministry in giving of finances, prayer and serving. Looking forward, I am anticipating a season where we will join the Apostle Paul in his prayer in Ephesians 3:20-21 that says, “Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.”
Peace,
Wade
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