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'We did it in two'

The frame, cladding and roof of Cromwell’s new worship centre would have been completed in two days, but the winds blew and rain came and it took three hours of another day.

“We planned to build a church for our community, but the community built a church for us,” says Alan Wilkinson, project manager for the 1350m 2 building. The Central Otago Presbyterian congregation first realised that they needed a new building when work on the Clyde Dam began and the small town’s population swelled.

About 15 years ago, Christine Hansen, then a new elder, came to believe that they had to be “doing church” differently. “Jesus called to the fishermen to put their nets down on the other side of the boat,” she says. “We needed to do things differently too, and God would honour our faith.”

A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then, but just over two years ago the congregation finally made a decision to get the new worship centre on the road. They sold the two churches they had, beautiful and shrouded in history, but too small and inappropriate for modern times.

Then work started on finding funds to develop the new worship centre. Applications were made to the Central Lakes Trust for a substantial grant towards the proposed cost of around $2.6m. When this wasn’t successful, the church leaders literally had to cast their net on “the other side”. A concept of inviting the wider Cromwell community to help build their church in two days began to take root and soon snowballed into reality.

“I wondered if it was possible,” says Alan, “until I realised that it was only the equivalent of eight houses. That seemed manageable.” Before long, an astonishing number of people offered their help: labour, amazing deals on materials and equipment, food for the workers, and local businesses pitched in with generous support. The community began to catch the vision, and wherever Alan and building convenor Murray Brown went, people put their hands up to help.

Early in the morning of Thursday 9 March, in an exercise reminiscent of the way Nehemiah rebuilt the walls around Jerusalem , a lonely concrete slab waited for three crews with a total of 120 men to start work. Half of the workers were builders who donated their time and the rest were keen volunteers.

Each crew, wearing specially designed t-shirts in one of three colours (yellow, green and orange) and the words “We did it in 2” on them, was responsible for one of the three areas – the 400-seat auditorium, the administration section with its kitchen, offices and foyer area, and the activity hall and meeting rooms for youth work and community activities. As they worked, a group of 30 women, under the able leadership of Edith Mackay, prepared food in the town hall kitchen and sent meals out to the site.

By the end of the first day, the frame was completely up. Then, on Friday, the rain and the wind came. “It was not all bad,” explained one of the building inspectors. “It provided an opportunity to further strengthen the frame ready for the roofing.” But it did mean the roofers, who couldn’t start work until the weather cleared, weren’t able to complete all of the roof by the end of the day. They had to come back on Monday.

There is a lot of finishing to be done, but the church hopes to open its new building for worship in July. They have a new slogan: “We’ll be in in two months”. The two-day event saved the congregation about $1 million in costs, but, more importantly, the community “owns” the building in a way they never would have if it had been built in a traditional way.