Preparing Your Physical House for Community
Preparing Your Physical Home for Community
When you’re turning your home into the hub for a community, your house matters.
The facility facilitates the activity.
In the early church times their houses were small but they had courtyards that could fit a good sized group and in most of those places it rarely rained.
Every climate, every home and every culture has its advantages and disadvantages when it comes to hosting community events.
One recent advantage is the architectural trend toward open concept houses with no walls between kitchens and a large gathering room. This is a great development for hosting community in the home.
When considering one's home I like to think of five spaces:
- Indoor meeting space
- Outdoor meeting space
- Kids play area
- Indoor childcare area
- Location - are you in a hub spot for the people you want to reach
Generally if you have two of these you can pull this off with some creativity but it’s good to know what is lacking and consider if it is possible over time to make some changes.
When we (the Pryors) bought the house we currently live in it literally had none of these except location.
We had to build the other four areas over the past 10 years as we added on an indoor and outdoor meeting space and childcare area in a finished basement and just this week we began work on our outdoor kids play area.
As you’ll see, community is a multi-year investment and often starts slow and small so don’t freak out if you’re lacking most of these but you need to have a clear vision for how to facilitate this calling.
One thing to consider is that it’s estimated that churches in the US spend more than $25B per year on buildings and land.
It could make sense as more church ministries are being faciliated in homes to assist families financially as they seek to make their homes more useful for ministry.
This can be done in the form of a Housing Allowance which the IRS created from the time when church clergy lived on church property and used their home as an extension of their ministry.
Take some time to consider how ready your home is to facilitate gatherings of a community and any thoughts about improvements that can be made over the years to upgrade your home as a gathering hub.
Need some coaching?
We'd love to to provide coaching for your household and help you on your journey toward seeing a healthy kingdom community emerge in your home.
Check out our coaching intensive, A House For Community for more information and to apply!