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Freddy
Villarreal
www.freedomlifechurch.com
1) planting a church in an
emerging/postmodern culture, what do you think are the key elements
of a community of faith in an emerging/postmodern
culture?
I
think the key elements are fundamentally the same as they always
have been- 1. Present the same Truth within the
context of the culture that you are trying to reach. Just
like missionaries have been doing for hundreds of years.
Just like Paul did on Mars Hill. Just like Jesus did
through parables. You present the life changing truths of
God in a way that make sense to the culture you are trying to
reach. 2. Don't water things down.
Unfortunately, many church planters seem to think that we have
to leave some major things out in order to be heard. I
believe that is the biggest mistake we can make. When we
communicate the truth, in LOVE, it will be received, and that is
what sets people free. Not how good our band sounds, or
how cool our Media Shout presentation is, or how many songs we
play off the radio. It is the gospel that sets people
free. 3. Keep it real. The emerging culture
that we minister to is sick of hypocrisy in the church. So
how do we avoid that. We put it all out there. We,
pastors, set the example by being transparent about the fact
that we are still struggling with things, learning, and growing
too. We extend grace, and ask for grace as well. We
don't have to have it all together, we just have to keep trying
to be more like Christ each day, and stop asking people to do
something that we aren't willing to do.
2) what do you see as the
four (because three is too traditional) to differences between
the community of faith you are serving, and those churches in
your area?
1.
Acceptance- our church is whole-heartedly committed to accepting
people just as they are, no matter what, and allowing them the
freedom to grow into an understanding of who God desires them to
be. Pierced or tattooed they will fit right in with our
pastoral staff. Addicted, struggling, sexually broken,
whatever...there is a safe place to experience the love of
Christ at Freedom Life.
2.
Flexibility- we constantly evaluate what we are doing and if we
don't like the results we change it. We aren't afraid to
try something new or stop something that just isn't working.
We don't serve our programs, our programs serve us.
3. Commitment
to the Vision- our vision as a church is, "To be a
community of believers who stand in victory and share to the
emerging culture the freedom of life as lived by faith, grace,
and God's unconditional love." This is truly the
measuring rod for everything that we do. We don't try to
do everything that everyone else is doing, and we don't care if
someone doesn't like it. We do what we do with all our
heart and it has to fall directly in line with our vision as a
church.
4. Kingdom
Mindset- every week we remind our folks that it is not all about
Freedom Life Church. We give 10% of everything we get to
the building of orphanages and schools in a foreign country and
we try to send different churches a financial blessing
periodically as well. There is another church plant in our
area that uses our facility for praise band practice once a
week, and another postmodern church that been kicked out of the
school they were meeting in who will be using our facility on
Sunday morning for the next 6 weeks. We are constantly
trying to help other local ministries financially and with
resources.
3) is the community you
serve connected with a denomination? if "yes,"
what do you see as the benefits and problems with that
relationship, and if "no," what do you believe are the
benefits and problems without being connected?
Yes,
we are willing participants with the Baptist
General Association of Virginia. The biggest benefits
are accountability and finances. They give us accountability
that really helps when a traditional church
down the street calls us a cult :) And they gave us some
money to help get us going. It has been a huge
blessing! We haven't had any problems yet with this
relationship, and it has been great.
4) what would you say are
the two hardest things connected to planting an
emerging/postmodern community of faith?
1.
Gathering a core group of truly committed and available people.
Many Postmoderns are already over committed or fear commitment.
Many also have been taught a very shallow concept of "me
first" when it comes to commitment. Wait on solid
people and ask God to keep sending them.
2.
The Discipleship Curve. For some reason, we cannot assume
anymore that just because someone grew up in church they have a
basic understanding of Biblical principles, spiritual formation,
or authentic spirituality. The truth is, many of the Postmoderns
that come to our church have been in churches for a
while, but are still only focusing on experiential truths, like
intimate worship. Balancing experience with truth is
important and essential for long term success in the postmodern
culture.
5) how does your community
of faith develop connections with those outside the community?
By
going out into the community with our events. We go to the
beach, have meetings at Starbucks, etc. We have
also connected with a local elementary school to serve the
community. We do fundraisers and give all the money to the
school so they can get new equipment. We help clean up the
campus, and tutor, etc.
6) what do you believe are
the key elements in an emerging/postmodern worship service?
Relevant
spirituality, authenticity, involvement, the Power of God being
free to lead!
7) what two key areas of
advise would you give to a person looking to plant a community
of faith in your area, or any area?
1.
Think big! We have a big God who does big things.
Don't settle for goals that you know you can accomplish.
Make them God sized and have the audacity to believe that God can
do those big things!
2.
Surround yourself with people who are smarter, funnier, braver,
and spiritually stronger than you are. Learn from anyone
who is willing to teach you, that has demonstrated that they
know what they are talking about. Find someone in your
area who has planted a successful church that does some of the
things that you feel called to do. Email the pastor and
invite him to lunch. Pick his brain. If he doesn't
respond to your email, he is probably busy. Call him,
write him a letter, swing by his office and offer to help him
any way you can. Then ask, ask, ask. Be a sponge.
Remember that you don't know it all. Let him talk.
Close your mouth and listen. He doesn't need to know all
about your vision for your future church. You will be
tempted to share your amazing vision, but just listen!
Remember, you are not there to recruit this guy, you are there
to learn.
3.
Count the cost and be ready to pay it. Most church plants
fail! If you are not willing to put in the hours, pay the
price emotionally, physically, and spiritually, and give
everything you got to make this thing happen then go sell cars.
You will make a lot more money selling cars than selling a
vision, and you will not add to the miserable statistic of
church planters that fail.
4.
Focus on your relationship to God before you focus on everyone else. You will be busy if you are
successfully planting a
church, and it will be easy to have your days, weeks, months
quickly absorbed by everything except God. Don't be a
hypocrite, and don't become another statistic. Pray, read
your Bible, remember why you are doing this in the first place.
5.
Repeat step 2 again :)
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