In December of 2009 the news was given that the current Studio 501 was going to be moving to a new location on base for the new Studio 501. I wasn’t working in Studio 501 at that point but that was where God was leading me and my family for our future ministry. This was great news because we not only acquired newer and bigger space, but we were given the chance to design and build it the way a studio should be built. After a year and a half of plans being made for the building of the new studio demolition began in June of 2011. The move in date was announced for the 1 things didn’t turn out the way we thought. So began the journey of God walking us through patience, trust and faith that he would provide. As with any new project we ran into some budget issues, finding out things would cost more than they were along the way and so on. We were going through our budget quicker than expected and were left in the place of waiting for God to provide.
January 1st 2012 came and went and we didn’t even have our floating floors poured for each room. I’m not going to lie we were definitely worried about how this floor was going to get paid for. But since that point we have seen God’s faithfulness like normal! On February 24 were finally poured with the help of a professional concrete pourer from Spokane who donated his labor to get this done. The company that engineered our floor gave us a huge discount on the design and plans of the floor. So a floor that should have cost us 50,000 dollars to build cost us 20,000 dollars. It’s funny how easily we get caught up in the stress and doubt and wonder how God is going to provide the money for our needs. Not only did the money come through but he provided a professional to come and help us pour the floor and gave us a huge discount through our floor engineer. And this is the story of the new Studio 501.
Our walls and ceilings have ¾” double layered MDF on them. This was donated to us by a local lumber yard Plumb Creek Lumber; this was a 30,000 dollar donation. We were going to use sheetrock and would have had to pay for it, but God provided above and beyond. MDF is what we have chosen to build with if we had an unlimited budget but that wasn’t an option. It was only an option because this is God’s studio not ours. If we tried to do this on our own we would have had to cut corners and the studio would have been fine, but because of God’s perfect timing and provision we got the materials we wanted for free.
Our HVAC (Heating, Ventilation, Air Conditioning) system for the new studio needed to be very specific for our air tight rooms and it needed to run very quietly because we can’t have a machine making any noise while are recording. Through some connections with 100 Fold Studio we found a guy in Alabama who designed our HVAC system for free so we only had to pay for parts. We had a church from Michigan send a team to our base to help us build all over our campus. A few of the guys on the team helped us install the HVAC in the attic so in the end labor was free thanks to a group of people who took their vacation time to come out here and work for a week when they could have been relaxing on a beach for a week.
Early on in the construction process, before we knew what hit us we had spent all of our budgeted money for our electrical on an electrician. We had no clue how we were going to make the budget work to get the rest of the electrical finished in the studio. Lo and behold God provided for us again. On another VWAP (Vacation With a Purpose) team from Stanwood Washington there was an electrician who was able to get signed off by our electrical inspector to work on our building. In one week we went from 5% of our electrical done to 90% done. We saved 10,000 dollars in one week because of the donated time of the electrician and the guys that helped him pull wire and hang boxes.What a blessing!
So this is the story of the new Studio 501. As of today August 7th 2013 we are 70% done with the new Studio 501. Throughout the past 2 years we have seen God’s hand throughout the construction of the new Studio 501. This is God’s studio not ours. With his provision he has only made the studio better; better than we could have ever done on our own. What in the normal world would have cost us around 1 million dollars to build, this studio when finished will have cost us 70,000 dollars. God is a good God and even when we doubt and fear he chooses to provide for us even when we think what is ahead is impossible. Thank you God for your provision!
