LAKELAND — "We’re here to build a church, not a building," said the Rev. Tim Carson, pastor of Shepherd’s Community United Methodist Church here. "We care about families and kids in our community. This is a way for us to serve our community."

The 100-member church, which was launched in 1998, recently decided to start its building program by constructing a playground on its 10 acres of land in south Lakeland, instead of a building.

"We felt the need, we identified it and the people felt like we needed to do it," Carson said.

The need, he says, is for a well-built, well-maintained playground for children. Although there are at least four playgrounds within about eight miles of the church, Carson says they are all small, and the closest one is in disrepair.

Once that need was identified, Carson said church members spent a month praying about it, then voted "unanimously yes" to go ahead and build the playground.

"We decided that rather than let the property sit idle to build a community playground before a building," he said. "It’s kind of a crazy thing, if you think about it."

The church is leasing office space near its property and is meeting for worship in a local school. Carson says the congregation does not plan to build its own facility until it is financially strong enough.

Since the vote, the project has taken on a life of its own. A task force of volunteers from the church has agreed to oversee it. A friend of Carson’s from Kentucky submitted a plan, which has grown and evolved as people in the church have discussed it.

Through postcards mailed to the community and the church’s Web site, the church has gotten input from its neighbors. Of the 41 responses so far, 33 have said they would use a playground. One local couple raising their grandchildren wrote that they are "hard-pressed to find good areas to play and especially in this area."

"Though we cannot help financially at this time, we would certainly put this item on our prayer list," they wrote. "Thank you for your efforts."

Carson said construction will probably be in three phases. The first is the actual playground, including a 30' Noah’s Ark, slides, a multilevel castle, an enclosed toddler area and a jogging track. Water fountains and restrooms will be added in the second phase. The third phase calls for barbecue equipment and a picnic pavilion large enough for occasional worship services.

Since the playground is a community outreach project, the church will ask individuals and businesses to support it. "We’re trying to get people to connect to our congregation," Carson said. "We’re hoping they’ll contribute financially or through working shoulder-to-shoulder, helping to build this."

The church has also written two grant applications to Polk County requesting as much as $80,000, which would cover more than half the expected cost for the first phase.

Although the plans are not final, Carson says the church will begin securing financial and volunteer support in mid-September and hopes to have enough volunteers and money to complete the first phase during consecutive weekends in November.

"This is our goal—it’s what we want to do, but we’re not going to sink the congregation doing this," he said. "We’ll go with what the Lord provides and go from there."

While he admits dealing with the details, planning and working out the problems can be "a huge headache," Carson says building the playground is part of the "growth…and faith-building process we’re going through as a church."

"None of us are professional playground builders or fund-raisers," he said. "But this is what we’re supposed to do. First and foremost, it’s what God wants us to do."