Church Design

Aspen Group Blog

Knowledge to navigate the intersection of church culture, leadership, ministry, and facilities.

Shannon Jirik

Shannon Jirik serves as assistant brand manager for Keyhole Marketing.

Blog Feature

Church Design | church facilities

When Your Church Is Portable: 5 Ways to Create Effective Ministry Space

By: Shannon Jirik
August 07, 2019

Churches are popping up in schools, community centers, and warehouses. They’re meeting in movie theaters, coffee shops, and even comedy clubs. While many churches plant roots in permanent facilities, churches often start out mobile and borrow or rent space that's primarily used for another purpose.

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Project Profiles | Multisite | Renovations | alignment conference

Building for Community Impact: Community Christian Church Plainfield

By: Shannon Jirik
August 08, 2018

Community Christian Church, a dynamic, growing faith community whose mission is “helping people find their way back to God,” launched a new multisite location—Community Christian Church Plainfield—in 2016. Recognizing the need for an innovative space where people could connect and the community could embrace its love for athletics, Community Christian Church Plainfield, the location for the 2018 Alignment Conference, embarked on a complete renovation of a former manufacturing plant with the help of Aspen Group, an integrated design-build-furnish company for churches.

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Making Space for Millennials Executive Summary

Making Space for Millennials Executive Summary

Discover the impact Millennials' values, allegiances, and assumptions will have on your church.

Blog Feature

Multisite | Managing Facilities

How to Cool the “Thermostat Wars” at Church

By: Shannon Jirik
December 14, 2017

Typically, the most heated conflicts in a church have to do with differences in theological or scriptural interpretations and doctrinal beliefs. But there’s another aspect of church life that gets temperatures rising and causes daily dissension—“thermostat wars.” How many times have you struggled to keep everyone comfortable in a sanctuary that’s not too hot, not too cold—just right for everyone? And when your heat or air conditioning kicks on, does it sound and feel like a sonic boom just went off?

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Blog Feature

Church Construction | Managing Facilities | alignment conference

Protecting Your Church From Fire

By: Shannon Jirik
December 06, 2017

Aspen Group works with a number of trusted tradespeople and professional partners on its church building projects. In this post, we’re highlighting Metropolitan Fire Protection (Metro FP), a leading commercial and residential sprinkler contractor, serving the Chicago metropolitan area and Northwest Indiana for more than 25 years.

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Events | Multisite | alignment conference

Launching Your Next Church: A Recap of Aspen’s 2017 Alignment Conference

By: Shannon Jirik
October 30, 2017

What do we do when we run out of space? How do we answer God’s call to plant another church or campus site? Where will we find the resources we need to launch a new church? How do we train leaders and raise funds? How do we engage Millennials? Is it even the right time to start thinking about planting a new church? As a church leader, you may find yourself asking these same questions. Weren’t able to make it to Aspen’s 2017 Alignment Conference? Here’s a quick recap of the main stage keynote talks.

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Project Profiles | Renovations

The Orchard Evangelical Free Church: A Remodel that Bears Fruit

By: Shannon Jirik
June 29, 2017

Deep love for church. Passion for worship. Drive for the expansion of the Kingdom of God. All of these things define The Orchard Evangelical Free Church and its congregation. Their mission: “To glorify God by multiplying God-centered, Christ-exalting, world-transforming believers through the gospel in the greater Chicago area and around the world.” As part of fulfilling their calling as a church, The Orchard launched four new sites between 2010—2017 from the original Arlington Heights campus. To thrive in this next chapter of their story, the church’s leadership recognized that it needed the Arlington Heights campus to be a vibrant, growing, sending campus—the center of an expanding multisite church. Turning the Arlington Heights campus into a 21st century space was a key step to ensuring The Orchard would live out its mission.

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Project Profiles | Renovations

Christ The Rock Community Church: Rediscovering Community

By: Shannon Jirik
June 08, 2017

Christ The Rock Community Church (CTR), located in rural Menasha, Wisconsin, is a non-denominational church with a deep heart for authenticity and relationships. With a mission to “seek the lost, love the hurting, and disciple believers to do the same,” the church extends its arms and opens its doors to foster the vision that everyone, no matter their condition, can know and worship Jesus.

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