During the pastorships of both Brendan and Chris negotiations continued with the Borough Council for the church to buy a plot of designated land to erect a church building.  There were many frustrations and false starts, but the original conviction remained that there should be a church building as well as a church in Eastern Oswestry. 

Derek Kemp of Church Projects Ltd had been approached and he created a new plan for a church building.  He also conducted a very detailed survey of Eastern Oswestry in order to inform the planning process.  When we talked to him about how long it would take to build the church we were rather taken aback by his reply.  The gist of it was that the actual physical building of the church would not be long, but it would not happen until the company of people called ‘the church’ were ready!

That process of the church ‘being ready’ has taken shape over the years since then.  Over time, the place where the church should be built moved around the area slightly, but definitely away from the site where we would have had to spend a great deal of money building a roadway!  The fellowship continued to grow in number and was reaching the capacity of the school hall, and we were moving into more and more classrooms for Sunday school.  The school itself was also expanding, and asked us if we could move out during the summer holidays whilst building work was undertaken.  As the Eastern Oswestry Community Centre had been completed we moved in there, originally just for the summer holidays.  But the decision was then taken to stay in the community centre as it gave us more scope for expansion. 

As the three years of Chris’s ministry were drawing to a close, the decision needed to be made whether to renew his contract.  As it was not clear what decision should be made, Brian Johnson, an elder from Carreg Llwyd, was asked to chair the meeting.  By this time Cabin Lane Church had become an independent church in its own right, but felt the need of support from its parent at this time.  The painful decision was made that it was not right to reappoint Chris for a further term.  Happily God undertook, and Chris, Ho Soon and their boys now live near Chepstow where he pastors a church.