Bethel Reformed Church in Sheldon, Iowa is in the process of building a new Minstry Facility. Construction began in July 2023. To stay up to date with the construction process, check out the Bethel webpage here. https://bethelsheldon.org/
Here’s some info from the NW Iowa News:
Pastor Dave Van Kley has officially labeled the past six years for Bethel Reformed Church as the “land in between.”
The congregation of Bethel has been without a true home since a fire to its multistory church building at 611 Seventh St. in Sheldon in September of 2017. The blaze prevented further use of the structure. Bethel has been holding services at the Sheldon High School auditorium since.
But the land in between era for Bethel is almost over.
Van Kley had a shovel in his hands on Thursday, June 1, as he plunged it into the ground to remove a clump of dirt. The simple task was a monumental one as it signified the groundbreaking for Bethel’s new church building at 610 Seventh St., across the street south from where the former building used to sit before being torn down a year ago.
The path may not have been easy to get to the point of a groundbreaking, but Van Kley said it has been a good process to get to this point.
“God has done some amazing things in that,” he said. “He teaches you things in the middle of the hard times and in the middle of the wilderness, like the children of Israel experienced. God forms your character, he molds you, He teaches you lessons about yourself about who we are as a church, and we’ve definitely seen Him doing work. My prayer became ‘God do the work you want to do at Bethel church.’ I have lots of ideas, but you do what you need to do.’
“That’s what he’s done. That’s how he shaped and deepened our character through the whole process.”
Bethel’s congregation is 130 households which is in between 250-300 members.
Poppema-Sikma Construction in Sheldon is the lead contractor for the building, and Van Kley said he anticipates the new church will be completed in about a year.
While the fire forced the issue a little more, leadership at Bethel has been looking to move locations for a couple of decades. Bethel Reformed Church officially bought the land from the Sheldon School District in 2005 with plans to build a new facility at the site of the former Sheldon Middle School.
Bethel’s former facility was more than 7,000 square feet, but it was built in 1948 and had a few too many staircases, which led to the leadership to look at potentially constructing a new church after they bought the land across the street.
“The old building was beautiful, but it was very limiting, and it was especially challenging with the steps in it,” Van Kley said. “You couldn’t go anywhere without going up or down. So, it was an ongoing conversation, and finally, the fire was a catalyst for us to say, ‘OK, what are we going to do?’”
The congregation decided Bethel’s future was not in the fire-damaged structure. That led to a long process of what a new church was going to look like.
Bethel initially had a grandiose plan for a dream church that would have been 21,000 square feet, but it was not feasible plan.
Van Kley said it took following God’s direction to come up with the plans Bethel currently has for a 10,800-square-foot future facility.
“God just directed us in a very clear way toward building what we could afford,” Van Kley said. “We just realized we really need a place. We’ve gone long enough in the land between and worshipping in temporary places and facilities. So, that just really got the ball rolling to take the step of getting us to this point.”
The building will have spaces that are flexible and have lots of open areas that can be transformed into whatever the Bethel wants to use them for.
“If we’ve learned anything over the last while is how to be flexible, and this space is going to be very flexible,” Van Kley said. “We are going to be able to use it and adapt it for what we want to do with it for any given ministry opportunity. We made the shift from thinking it all had to be dedicated specific space to understanding that space is space. You make it do what you need it to do at a given time.”
The estimated cost for the building, which includes furniture for when construction is done, is about $3.4 million. Van Kley said Bethel has cash pledges of a little under $3 million, so the church needs an additional $400,00 through additional pledges or financing.
