Most people don’t realize this, but pews in a church are designed to only last 25 years or so. Of course, it depends on the wood, but pews are rarely built out of the very best wood. No one could afford them. After you pass the 25-year mark all warranties are over. After that, if a pew breaks or collapses, you are on your own as far as the impending lawsuit goes. Our pews are way older than that, so it might be something to keep in mind.

          We were once at a church where we had a pew problem. The church had been built in 1840. The first pews were crafted by the men in the church and those early records tell of complaints from folks about splinters and babies falling through the back of the pews because the backs didn’t come all the way to the bench. Those pews were replaced 30 years later out of necessity. The original pews began to come apart all at about the same time. The new pews were made by a local craftsman, so they all had the advantage of looking alike. Over the next 50 years or so they were painted, repaired and discarded one at a time. Sometime in the 1930s those pews were replaced. The new ones lasted not quite 20 years. One buckled and dumped an entire family onto the church floor. Save a little money but buy twice. Foolish. In 1952 the church bought the next set of pews. Those were the pews that were their when Marsha, our son and myself arrived in 1995.

          As pews go, they were fine, I suppose. I figure that even if the pews look a little rough (and these did) you can put enough people in them so that no one notices. These pews had held up pretty well precisely because there hadn’t been many people in them for a long time. They served their purpose.

          The problem started as attendance began to go up. As people began to see new folks coming in and the church growing Spiritually, there began to be a new desire to take better care of God’s house. Updating the church began to be an issue. Painting started, first in the sanctuary, then throughout the church. After painting and minor repairs, new tables were bought for the fellowship hall and Sunday school. You can’t have new tables without new chairs, right? New, padded chairs were bought. We had a room off the sanctuary called The East Room. It was as long as the sanctuary and about a third as wide. It was separated from the sanctuary by a folding wooden wall. The original idea was that this room would be over flow for the sanctuary, but normally would serve as a lounge and meeting room. Since the sanctuary sat just over 200 people and there hadn’t been that many in the church in a long, long time (the day we were voted in, which is a big day for a church, the vote was 48 for, 1 against) that wooden wall had not been opened for a long time. The furniture in The East Room had gotten old and nasty. When the day came that we needed to open the wall and set up chairs, people could see how decrepit the old place was getting. So, The East Room got a make-over and new furniture and they did my office at the same time. New furniture all the way around.

          If you are going to repair and paint and do all that, you need new floor coverings. It was the new floor coverings that ended the old pews.

          The carpet in the sanctuary was old. No one could remember when it had been laid. It would need to be replaced first. That meant that the pews would need to be moved out. They were bolted to the floor, so it took a bit to remove them into The East Room. The new carpet was to be laid, but first we put down laminate over the whole floor, then the carpet in the aisles and open areas, so those bolt holes had to be cut into the laminate. We thought of everything. Except we never thought to mark the pews to tell us where they were in the church. That was an issue we hadn’t considered. All the bolt holes matched up, so the pews all went back without a problem. But over the years buildings will settle and even twist. Since the pews had been bolted to the floor, they went through those same, gradual changes. In some places the floor had bowed up a few millimeters, which cause the pews to do the same. In other places the floor had bowed down a few millimeters, causing the pew to do the same. In some places the floor had flexed a tie little bit, as did the pew. Nothing you could see with the eye and no real problem.

          Except now the old pews had to bend and flex in new directions. Old, dried wood doesn’t do that well. Within the first few weeks a packed pew cracked during morning service. Seriously, it sounded like a gun shot. It didn’t fall and the people safely evacuated. We all kind of laughed about it and went on. The way it cracked it could not be fixed easily. In the next month, three more cracked. We needed to do something.

          Thus, began my education in pew science.

          We got quotes from all over, finally settling on a company out of Toledo. I was determined we were not going to go with the lowest bidder, and the committee did well looking for price, quality and comfort. We all learned more than we ever wanted to know about pews, but it ended up worth it. We finally settled on a plan and put in our order. The pews were not already made; they would be made to order. We would be out of pews for two to three months.

          First, we offered the old pews to anyone who would give a certain amount to the Youth fund. Sold a few that way. Then we posted them on Craig’s List for anyone who wanted the rest. Everything was explained about their condition. We offered them free. You had to come and get them and take the whole lot. A church un Indiana came and took them away.

          Now we had a sanctuary empty of everything. It echoed. We had VBS during that time and the sanctuary became the center of it. It rained every night, but we had that wide-open space for games and activities. We decided they would only need a month to build the pews, so we would use the chairs from Fellowship Hall for the sanctuary. As it turned out, it took four months and people started bringing lawn chairs. We never even brought out the Hall chairs.

          We become creatures of habit. Sit in the same pew, talk to the same people, use the same door. Human nature. Those four months changed that. First, with the lawn chairs people sat anywhere they wanted and with whomever they wanted. We tried to keep some order. We took an offering every week and we also did Communion every week, but we could not get people to sit in neat rows. We solved that by having people come forward to take their Communion and give their offering at the same tune. Streamlined the service. You would think that people would all try and sit at the back windows, but just the opposite was true. They all gradually moved forward. And you would also think that attendance would fall off. Again, the opposite was true. Attendance actually went up. We became the ‘fun’ church in town. Quite a site to be in the pulpit area and look out at a sea of lawn chairs arranged in a chaotic manner. It was the fun church.

            Everyone in the church was disappointed when the pews finally came and were installed.  

          The pews were the last thing to be done there as far as renovations. From the time we arrived at the church to the pews arriving was seven years. When we were all done we had spent just over $300,000 on the structure. It was 1990’s money, so it would be much more now. When we went to there, the church had less than $10,000 in the bank in various accounts. When the last pew was screwed down we had over $75,000. How is that even possible? Also, during the 11 years we were there, we expanded the ministry each year. Something new all the time. We spent way more money than we had to start with, yet we had plenty at the end and we never borrowed. When we went there the church had various fund-raising events to raise money to keep the church open. By the end, the ladies’ group, equal to our Guild, had a rummage sale once a year to raise money for their ministry and we sold grape pies at the Grape Jamboree for the Youth. We got to where we didn’t even count the cost when we felt like something we were going to do was in God’s will. We did it on faith and He never let us down.

          When people look at God’s leading and say, “We can’t afford that. Another, bigger church, maybe. But not us” that church is saying, “We don’t have enough faith.” When I am told it won’t work here, I can only think what can be done if the people open themselves up to real faith and see in themselves a new desire. I wish for you that you could experience the joy for yourselves.

          You will never sell God short. He will just prove Himself again with another congregation. You only sell yourself short.