Chris Swan: Notice that this blog posting's title is not "Churchdock," which sounds better than, "Churchbuildingdock."On Friday the 28th of October I drove the Illuminate 2 all of the way to Red Sea Church in Portland. I have been told that Portland is the least churched city in the United States of America. This means that the church building corresponding to Red Sea Church has a large part of its mission ahead of it, although it has been in dire need of a refit.
I became the least part of this refit which took place on the date mentioned above. ~70 men of the Acts 29 network spent ~400 man-hours on this building which had appeared as yet another part of a disfunctional neighborhood.
Upon my arrival I was quite pleased to hear that one of the men who was a pastor of mine at the Evangelical Free Church of Pullman while I was in Pullman was in attendance with the elders of Alathia Community Church which began with them in Issaquah Washington. He reminded me that I was the only college student who came into his church and immediately asked for a docrinal statment, remarking that this was beautiful for him to observe. I had not realized what an impression I had made.
To see so many men working on so many different parts of a semi-symmetrical structure with multiple levels made me think of the battle-damaged Enterprise starship getting fixed up in spacedock for another mission, hence the title of this blog posting. These parts included
- Painting of many rooms with multiple ladders and multiple paint colors in each room
- Construction of two counter tops with framing and sheetrock
- Construction and wiring of one sound booth with a platform, framing, and sheetrock
- Installation of eight ceiling fans utilizing one one man lift
- Much landscaping
- Much demolition of visually archaic furnature
- Demolition of crack shack (quite common in this neighborhood)
- Plumbing for new sinks (with new counter tops) in four restrooms
- A fair amount of pressure washing
- Other things
Even so I have determined that I am quite happy that I have an engineering job which does not require any skill regarding paint. I spent most of my time there doing interior painting while standing on a ladder. I am not particularly proud of my work, for it was slow and its results were often sub-par, although they did improve. I don't know why the leader pointed that job out as "unskilled."
On the bright side, the Illuminate 2 managed another 350 wreck-free miles, dispite my allegedly poor handling, which a spiritual superior has had the effrontery to point out; it must be quite bad, but I am yet unconvinced. The man paid me an extra 25% for the drive, most likely this was a tip for not wrecking. What do you think?
