Freedom Church of Fort Worth.....a review

So Mandy and I are still in the long and arduous task of finding a church to join here in Fort Worth. As of yet, the LORD has not led us to a particular one. However, the church we last visited had some promising characteristics that I'd like to share.

Freedom Church of Fort Worth wasn't a huge church. First pulling into the parking lot, it looked to be a small country church who just recently got enough funds to build a new building. The first thing I noticed was three or four families walking to the front. All of them were wearing jeans, some of the children wearing shorts and flip flops. I didn't see the first tie, and button up shirts were rare. Personally, this was a plus. I'm always excited to attend a church that cares more about the hearts of its people rather than the clothes that they wear.

We walk in to the Sanctuary, and within two minutes of entering the building we're greeted by none other than the pastor of the church himself. He introduces himself, asks our names, where we're from, how we heard about the church. He brought us over to a counter in the back where the church sells coffee and muffins before the service and introduced us to his wife. After we had made all the small talk that could be made, we went and sat down. While sitting there, two other people came and introduced themselves to us. The biggest thing I noticed was that none of them wore an "usher" name tag. They came up and introduced themselves because they were all about community and we were new.

The service started, and I had to endure through it a little. The praise band was big fan of distorted electric guitars and heavy drums. Don't get me wrong, I love a good rock song here and there. But when it comes to praise and worship, I'm more of an acoustic guitar and bongo drums kinda guy. The whine of electric guitars was a little distracting to me. So I did my best to simply focus on the lyrics of the songs we sang and not so much on their arrangement, and things seemed to go well.

The pastor then got up and explained that they used "worship stations." During the last song of the worship, there were different stations that you could go to of yoru own accord. One was for you to have communion with your family....the old dip the cracker in the grape juice version. That station also had a piece of wood with a nail in it to remind you of the pain Jesus endured on the cross. A second station was for prayer, where you could write down a prayer request and light a candle to represent that request, or you could go to pray for the requests that were already written down. And finally, a station in the back and a frame with some sort of paste spread in it next to a cup full of broken tiles and another cup with sharpies. You were supposed to write a word or draw a symbol on a piece of tile that represented a time when you were broken and then place it in the paste. The idea is that eventually, there would be mosaic of all the brokenness of the church. The point is this: we're just a bunch of broken people, but when God calls us together for His work, He turns us into a beautiful work of art. All in all, it was different and took a little getting used to. Mandy wasn't a big fan of a communal cup that everyone dipped their crackers in, but aside from that the stations seemed like an interesting, if not unique, form of worship.

There was an offertory after the song, followed by a five-minute intermission before the sermon where people were allowed to get more coffee, stretch, and just walk around. Then the preaching started. No pulpit, this guy got right down in front of us and sat in a chair. The lesson wasn't so much his lecturing to us as it was a group discussion. He asked questions of the congregation and expected to be answered back. It was an interesting dynamic, and it was a little hard to follow. If it weren't for the notes in the bulletin, I don't know that I'd get the point of the message. But then again, I'm used to standard 3-point Baptist sermons with an introduction, body, and conclusion. Group discussion was something I was never good at. On a positive note, he spent a lot of time in the original languages, explaing meanings and where English and Hebrew had some issues in translation. I appreciated this a lot--it showed me that the pastor cares about study and understanding authorial intent, not just what the pastor he had told him.

(He managed to work in references to the Matrix, Star Wars, and Star Trek, in his sermon as illustrations. I was in hog heaven.)

After the sermon was an invitation time. Both the pastor and his wife waited up front to receive people, which I thought was a good idea. (If a woman is experiencing extreme pain from her ovaries, it's kinda hard to talk to a male pastor about that.) The worship stations were opened up again. After the song ended, the pastor gave announcements, we prayed, and then we were dismissed.

Before we could get out the door, the pastor ran us down again and talked with us afterward. He introduced us to his daughter (who is attending Southwestern) and son-in-law, and then we started talking about Seminary. (Turns out he graduated from Southwestern back in the 80's.) In the time it took for us to talk, three more families came and introduced themselves to us, again not wearing any usher name tags, just being friendly. By the time we were ready to leave, we probably had met nearly half the church, and they all came to us.

We talked about ministry and community. The pastor said their method of evangelism is kind of backwards. Rather than getting them saved and then welcoming them into the community, they welcome the people into the community first and love them to Christ. He gave the example of an atheist who came there two years ago and basically said, "I'm just here to check things out. Leave me alone." The pastor said fine and didn't push the guy, but made sure he felt welcomed and invited him to everything the church did. He was baptized two months ago, and it wasn't because someone beat him over the head with a Bible. It was because he saw real Christianity at work, and it made him desire Christ.

Of course, being a Seminary student, the question in the back of my mind is "do you give to the cooperative program? Will I get the discount on tuition if I join here?" I utterly loathe and hate that its something to consider, but it is. Where we end up joining will have a huge impact on how we handle our finances, so it's a point of concern. It does not dictate where we end up joining (God will provide the money one or the other), but it does affect decisions we make as a result of where we join. Thankfully, the pastor brought it up before I said anything about it. "Yeah, I really would like to give to the cooperative program, because it's a good thing and it would help on my daughter's tuition. But I can't justify giving to it for just my family. If I had about 4 or 5 families here that attended the seminary, I would definitely be open to giving to it, but right now it would just seem too self-serving." Gotta hand it to the guy for having principles. So, in the end, no this isn't a church on Southwestern's special list, but it could be.

So, all in all, there are a few things I wasn't wild about, but those things were issues of personal preference, not doctrine. And they definitely have a community-driven ministry that cares just as much about the school and houses across the street as it does some obscure village in Asia. So, while God hasn't been clear about where He's calling us yet, if He did call us to Freedom Church or Fort Worth, I'd be okay with that.

Feel free to comment or ask questions. I'm always here.

Keep Soaring,

B