2_08: Bob Bergmann – What story does the design of your church tell?

By mmb_admin | December 12, 2019

Breakthrough ideas with Bob:

The church needs to go where all the people are going.
Visioneering Studios is called to help the church put to form the stories about the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in heaven.
Every building tells a story, and sometimes the story told is that we are cheap and just putting something together.
Sometimes the story our building tells is that “We copied something that looks successful somewhere else.”
What’s the prophetic story that God wants to tell through your community?
The Church is God’s best tool for redeeming this lost city; this lost civilization.
Sometimes we design for other things and miss what the greatest Designer has done.
We have to step back and look at where we’re going continually.
Don’t design from the property line in.
The Church is lagging because we don’t understand that people are dying of spiritual thirst.
We know lost people love the created work of God; they don’t know the creator God of that work.
People love the creation, but they don’t know the creator. Design can bridge that gap.
At some point, the church started looking like the buildings in the culture.
We create these great outdoor public spaces where the street sweeper and the stockbroker come together.
Where did our church buildings go off track? When did we lose the reflection of our Creator God?
Jesus asked these two questions: Who do you say that I am? Who do they say that I am?
You are going to spend the same amount of money doing something that looks more like the architect than a design that engages the lost.
If your church were to leave, what would people say is missing in the community? Most leaders realize outside the walls; nobody cares whether they exist or not.
Sometimes the building gets in the way of the message a church tries to communicate — even a word of beauty and order and design.
Utilizing the space between the buildings typically affects only 10% of the cost within the building.
We’re mimicking the Great Designer’s work. And let’s do that with our designs, with architecture, as well.
Make God famous. Bring Glory to God in your work.
Make God famous. We’re working hard at that, on Sunday morning, from the pulpit. But what if we worked just as hard in the lobby, and in the parking lot?
Architects want to be recognized for their style and acknowledged for something amazing they did.
As designers, we believe that it is not about us. Not about any awards received, it’s not about how photographed our buildings are or how many times they show up on Instagram. The design should be about how much glory it brings to God?
If you do good work – and I’m talking about architecture – and people can’t see you, but they can see God in it, that’s the success.

Breakthrough resources in this episode:

How Should We Then Live by Francis Schaeffer

As a small child, Bob loved art and design. The early building blocks that brought design into reality were his Lego set. Later, his love for science grew and then in his mid 20’s he surrendered his life to Jesus Christ.

Bob’s first full-time job in an Architect’s office gave him opportunities to design resorts and theme parks around the world over a 20-year span. Prior to joining Visioneering Studios, Bob served as the Principal Designer at AECOM. While at AECOM, he was giving up vacation time to design and build on the mission field. By November of 2002, As the first designer at Visioneering Studios, Bob’s dream of combining art, science and theology came together. Visioneering Studios believes that the Church is the best tool for the redemption of people and places.

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