Tulsa World published about our church plant (site) there

An article in The Tulsa World newspaper today...


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Freedom Valley hopes to attract church dropouts

By BILL SHERMAN World Religion Writer Published: 5/29/2010 2:20 AM

Nine households in Gettysburg, Penn., 33 people in all, left their homes and jobs several months ago and moved to Tulsa to start a church.

They are the second group of people who have moved to Tulsa in recent months to start an Assemblies of God church, part of a national emphasis on church planting in that denomination.

"My philosophy is, if you're going to live for God, it's going to be an adventure," said the Rev. Jason Fitch, founding pastor of the Freedom Valley Church in Tulsa, a church plant of the Freedom Valley Church in Gettysburg.

"It's scary, but it's fun," he said.

The church meets at 10 a.m. on the first Sunday of the month at the Tulsa Cinemark Theater, 10802 E. 71st St., where they rent three theaters, one for an adult service and two for children's services.

(In July, they will meet on the 11th to avoid the July Fourth holiday.)

Fitch said he fell in love with Tulsa in the 1980s when he lived here from ages 6 to 16 and always felt drawn to move back.

He graduated from Valley Forge (Penn.) Christian College in 1999 with a bachelor's degree in Bible and went to work immediately at his own church, Freedom Valley, first as a youth pastor and then as executive pastor.

Freedom Valley's primary focus is starting other churches, he said, with about 30 church plants in that area. In March 2009, he said, he felt God told him it was time to start a church in Tulsa. As he told his plans to people in his home church, several families decided to come with him as part of a start-up team.

Team members are committed to helping launch the church, he said. When weekly services begin Sept. 12, the members will be free to leave. However, he expects many to remain, especially those who moved here with children.

The Gettysburg church provides financial help to the Tulsa church, their most-distant church plant.

Why start a church in Tulsa, which already seems to have a church on every corner?

"Tulsa has some of the best churches in the country," Fitch said. "I'm blessed and honored to be here.

"But we want to reach people who have given up on church, who have had bad experiences with church."

The Rev. Frank Cargill, superintendent of the Oklahoma district of the Assemblies of God, said the denomination has a renewed emphasis on church planting, a challenge that came down from the national office.

"It's our feeling that, in order to reach this generation, we must be renewed in our focus for evangelism and outreach," he said.

"We do our best to connect with the societal needs of the community so that we become, hopefully, the church that Jesus built, which was more concerned about people than about buildings," he said.

Cargill said both Freedom Valley Church and the new City Church, meeting at the Tulsa Ballet building in Brookside, were in communication with his office as they developed their plans to move to Tulsa.

Steve Pike is coordinator of the Assemblies of God's Church Multiplication Network, a new organization charged with equipping, funding and networking church planters and those who help them.

"Church planting has always been a part of our culture as a movement," he said, "but now it's more intentional."

"We've seen an uptick in plants" since the initiative started, he said.

For decades, the denomination has started about 270 churches in the U.S. each year. The goal is 500.

"We're not there yet, but we're starting to see acceleration," he said.

And new churches partnering with the network tend to be stronger in attendance, giving and numbers of baptisms, he said.

Pike said at least 70 percent of Americans are not involved in a worshipping community, and every study shows that the best way to reach those people is to start churches.

There are exceptions, he said, but generally in older, established churches, relationships are more developed, people know and love each other and reaching new people becomes more difficult, he said.

Deeper, Deeper

"Sunday's Coming" Movie Trailer from North Point Media on Vimeo.

Okay, so I'm challenged that our worship services go a bit deeper than this parody. What do you all think?

Could every generation's liturgical norms be parodied as pointedly?

Resolution number 3

As I recall, there were about 2 resolutions at District Council this year.

On one hand, it is very nice to have so much peace and agreement in our District. Unity and agreement is a very pleasant thing indeed, and something that is blessed of the Lord.

But in the past year, I again read the book (actually listened to it this time) 5 Dysfunctions of a Team.

If I applied some of those principles, I gotta ask; do we have enough spirited discussion and challenging debate over the things that really matter? One of the dysfunctions is not being able to argue passionately over the stuff that really makes a difference.

Years ago, we added a requirement to our system where resolutions must be submitted months in advance and reviewed carefully by a team of parliamentarians, and whatever other processes. This seemed good at the time (as I recall) because hotheaded and spontaneous- perhaps poorly thought through- ideas could not be brought to the floor at all.

The thing worked, and we now have relatively peaceful meetings. Yes, we do disagree and passionately discuss certain details about the resolutions presented, and that seems fine I guess. But is there room for a resolution to be brought up spontaneously "for the good of the order", just because the Spirit is moving and someone thought up something good right there on the spot?

We get together and pray for God's leading, but how can He move? And how can we be a healthy team when there is no room for any resolution that was not thought up 800 years before (exaggeration intended for humor of course)?

Maybe this is just for me, because I am not the world's best planner. But after I read Tom Rees's report on the 83% of my friends and neighbors who will end up in Hell, and David Crosby's report that we have about the same amount of churches (and that we had when I started ministry in '83), I wanted to repent of lots of things, including but not limited to our issue with autonomy of the local church.

For example, I wanted to weep about the fact that I cannot think of a resolution to bring to next year's Council that really addresses the 83%. How would we, what would we, who would we, and where would we start? I have no serious ideas. The 83% should not expect anything good from me as it pertains to the rescue of their souls. They should get ready for a hot eternity, because I am bankrupt.

I was thrilled with the Decade of Harvest in the 90's. I was thrilled with Pastor Steve's idea to bless and give room for Catalyst leaders to work in the C3 plan. And I was thrilled with a lot of other ideas that better minds than mine have come up with over the years.

Yet, we are still about 360 churches, and close to the same amount of adherents here in PennDel. In my ministry lifetime, we have zoomed downward from at least 45% church attendance in America, to less than 20%! Yes, I think we should repent!

Minister friends, we have failed. We have failed our culture, and failed the Kingdom of God. We are losing the battle and from Penndel northward (the North East), we have failed the most of all! I do not wish to point to anyone else- I have not made a discernible difference myself.

In Romans, the Apostle Paul indicates that repentance is a gift that God gives. As I understand repentance, it is not a gift He has given me yet, (or us), yet in Penndel, as measured by our ability to reverse this horrible decline in percentage of people who will spend eternity in Heaven because they know Jesus. Oh God, have mercy on us an give us this treasure! We may not deserve it, but surely you love this 83% too much! If we in the PennDel District of the Assemblies of God are too hard hearted to receive it, please give it to some other group before more of our friends are lost forever!

I am not kidding around here, and not being light hearted. Seriously, does anybody have a reasonable idea to make the 83%, 82%? or 70%? Anybody? Anything? Yes, I know we are planting churches, and if we all live to be a hundred and fifty, MAYBE we will gain a little on it. (not that past performance would indicate that any of our plans will do anything, because since 1983, I and my fellow colleagues have NOT GAINED ONE CHURCH!)

Could there have been a resolution 3 this year that would have addressed the 83%? Does anybody even care? Or shall we come back next year and argue for three more hours about whether the word repentance is too strong for our national leaders to stomach? (sorry, my flimsy take on the little bit of this that I got to be part of)

My sons want me to teach them everything I know about ministry, they tell me. "Gotta be honest", I told them last night, "based on my performance since I got into ministry in '83, I got nothing for you. And don't read anything from anyone my age", I told them. "We are not prevailing. I pray that your generation will, but if you do, it will not be from what you have seen us do, for we have lost half of what we have been given!"