Shaping sacred space: Toward an evangelical theology of church architecture

Scripture and mission are two Evangelical commitments that help texture the gospel's theological expressions around the globe. The church's worship is a central expression of these commitments, and this implicates architecture as well. Traditionally, Evangelical architecture has been constrained in its theological expression by a Spirit-space tension in which people are so much God's dwelling that the potential for place lies unexamined. It is the purpose here to construct a theology of architecture that locates itself more usefully in relation to scripture and mission than has traditionally been done so. I argue that vernacular architecture has the potential to embody such a theology because its characteristic values of creation (nature), community and culture are biblical values as well.; To understand how a building might be theologically more expressive than another, it is important to identify hermeneutical categories. I appropriate Lindsay Jones' terms allurement and transformation for this purpose, the former referring to that aesthetic, reassuring quality that invites us into worship, and the latter referring to the aesthetic but more meaningful interaction combined with worship that challenges us to be what we are called to be in Christ. This aesthetic combination of architecture and liturgy functions as metaphor, which (according to Michael Polanyi) requires intrinsic interest in both form and function.; The visions of architecture in Ezekiel and Revelation both allure and transform. Located as they are in the trajectory toward the redemption that is new creation because of God's presence, their emphasis on creation and community is expressed in the cultural forms of their times. The church in the Spirit is God's presence in the world and its attention to architecture is a new creation product, a spiritual sacrifice. Thus the Evangelical vernacular church expressing values of creation, community and culture stands released from the constraints of the traditional Spirit-space tension and refitted as a suitable servant to the gospel on its global march.