e not
done so.

In building for community service the community should not make the
mistake of economizing because it imagines it cannot afford the best.
No community should build less than the best. If it does so, it
handicaps the community for a generation or more; and this is too
serious a matter to be lightly permitted. At the present time
religious organizations have national agencies which are serving to an
ever larger degree as a reserve resource for the purpose of aiding
local groups to build adequately. Thus the general organization aids
each year the limited number of local groups that find it necessary to
rebuild and renders unnecessary the maintenance of a replacement fund
by the local church for an indefinite period.

If it is impossible to build an entire building at one time it is
better to build by units, so that in the course of time a structure of
which the community may be proud will be completed. It should be
remembered that a community's solidarity and spirit are gauged largely
by the type of buildings it erects, and the church and community
building, representing as it does the deepest interests of man, should
be a living monument to community loyalty. Such a building becomes a
lasting inspiration to both old and young, pointing the way to the
highest and best in human life.

The building should be strategically located. As has been suggested,
people like to come to the center of the village for their social and
recreational life. The owner of a poolroom or a picture show that
would place his building a half mile in the country would not have a
large and enthusiastic patronage. The main street, near the center of
the village, is the place to be selected for the principal building of
the city, the community center.

Sometimes a well-meaning citizen will offer to a church a plot of land
far out on the edge of a village free of charge, provided the church
will accept it for the erection of the new structure. Sometimes the
Board of Trustees, thinking they will save a few hundred dollars,
gratefully accept the gift, thus violating the principle expressed in
the preceding paragraph. When a business man plans to put up an
expensive building he does not seek the cheapest land but the best
location regardless of the cost of the land. For illustration, a lot
on the edge of a village may cost but five hundred dollars, while a
lot in the center of the village may cost five thousand dollars. If
the propos