This page is still under construction. We want to share with our church members, former members, and supporters around the world the plan for our facilities in the long term, and give you the opportunity to give to this plan. By God's grace, we believe that He will make this plan come to completion in His time and His way and are trusting Him for the funds to make this possible. We understand that the ¥500,000,000 that we believe will be necessary to fully complete this project is far beyond our human ability and size to collect, but we serve a God who tells us in Psalm 50:10, "For every beast of the forest is mine, the cattle on a thousand hills..." and He is capable far beyond our ability. Please take time to look around and pray about how God may lead you to help.
Long Term Facility Plan
History of the Current Building
Our current church building was completed between 1961 and 1963. It includes the main sanctuary building, the annex, and the parsonage. The facilities have had some upgrades and surface level improvements over the years, but no structural changes to the layout of the facility either on the inside or the out.
Options Considered
Option 1: Build completely new building
When our Long Term Facility Team initially started seeking options for our buildings, we were initially under the impression that our building must be fully replaced with a new building, because earthquake building codes were changed and strengthened in the 1980's and 1990's and our buildings would never be capable of meeting the new codes. We also discovered in the process of talking with two different architectural firms that Yokohama City regulations governing required setback from roadways had changed, and our building is 2 meters past the edge of where building is currently allowed. The other problem that we thought would make a new building necessary is the fact that our land is located on a steep hillside and requires the use of two retaining walls that make the required building area possible. These walls are also more than 60 years old, and we were initially told they would need to be replaced.
We did go completely through an initial process of doing property surveys, and having an initial plan drawn up by one very reputable firm who has built numerous churches in Japan. They returned their idea and estimated cost to us in 2019 and it was estimated to be ¥950,000,000 (8.6 Million USD with 2019 Exchange rates). It was not an elaborate plan at all, but a very practical square multilevel building with almost no ornamentation, and the cost was still very significant.
Option 2: Reform the inside of the Building and reinforce the main structure
OCS