Exactly how much money is one square foot of space worth to your Bible teaching ministry? LifeWay training specialist Wayne Poling recently asked that question of a group of church leaders in Sacramento, California. He’d laid a one foot square foam board on each table in the room, then asked participants at a conference to decide just how valuable one square foot of space is. The church leaders determined that new construction prices could range anywhere between $100-$150 a foot depending on the community.

So if your church has become a holding tank for donated pianos and worn-out couches (those always find their way to the youth classrooms!), it’s costing you a lot of money! Case in point:

• Every round table in an adult classroom takes up 19 square feet. If a classroom holds four round tables (60″ diameter), those tables chew up $7600 worth of education space (assuming $100 per square foot. – and that’s on the low end). While tables may be great for places to set your coffee cup or lay out your Bible, they are very expensive in terms of the space they occupy.
• A donated couch used in a student ministry classroom takes up about 15 square feet. At $100 a foot, that’s $1500 for every classroom that has a couch in it! Ouch.
• Pianos have a similar cost, somewhere between the two examples above. The bottom line is, these three things are space killers in a church. The education space your church built is just too expensive to allow these kinds of objects to occupy that much space! It’s better to remove them from classrooms and add more chairs. Maximize your space and maximize the number of people who can actually attend a Bible study.

To maximize your Bible study space, remove old donated pianos (sell them or donate them), and do the same thing with those stained, donated couches in your student ministry area. Yes, your adults will miss those nice round tables, but think about how many more people you can seat if you simply placed chairs in the classroom!

How much money is your church giving up by having space killers all around the building? A short walk through your campus classrooms might prove to be a very eye-opening experience!

How much is that piano/couch/table costing your Bible teaching ministry? The answer is, “Too much.”

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