Life360 opens up a new world in Springfield churches

For the past 10 months, Damon Duran and his team of pastors have been asking themselves: Why start a new church in a city that already has hundreds?

“What makes us different?” he said.

The answer was clear.

Many of the churches in Springfield are monoculture churches, said Duran — either white, Hispanic or African American. He envisioned a multicultural church.

So Duran, who is Hispanic, and his wife, Saehee, who is Korean, started Life360 Intercultural Church as a “church plant” on Jan. 5.

“The way this works is other churches plant money into us and we have been strategizing … trying to gather pastors. As we raise funds for the church, the mother church decides you are no longer a church plant, you are a church,” he said.

It falls under other Life360 churches, which are Assemblies of God multisite churches with locations in Fordland, Hartville, Ozark and Republic, to name a few.

Life360 Intercultural Church will launch at 5 p.m. on Oct. 17 at its new home, 1349 W. Meadowmere St. The public is invited for the launch or any time. So far, they have about 53 regular members from 16 countries.

Instead of meeting on Sunday like a traditional church, they worship on Saturday night. If people are in established churches already, they can still join Life360 Multicultural church.

Services always start with a meal and fellowship. Each week, members pray for a specific country and the meal served is food from that country.

Justin Sabu, associate pastor from India, said the meal is key in establishing relationships and has been very popular.

“Most of our people like it because they can’t go to every part of the world, but we are trying to get the world to them. Food is one of the ways we do that. They experience the taste and the culture,” Sabu said.

The meal has been so successful that occasionally Hindus and Muslims have come to eat. After the meal, people are given a chance to leave if they are not comfortable staying. Sometimes they leave and sometimes they stay.

“But when they stay, they are hearing the word of God,” Duran said.

Aside from celebrating other cultures, there’s a lot of community outreach towards multicultural minorities.

Duran and his wife, who is also a pastor, volunteer at Central High School each week and assist with the English Language Learners (ELL) students. They’ve started a monthly luncheon at OTC for ESL students. They are chaplains for Springfield Police Department.

About three months ago, they organized classes to teach people English and church volunteers go to people’s homes to teach them English.

There are free ESL classes in Springfield, but Duran said the biggest reason people don’t take advantage of those classes is either they don’t have child care or transportation is an obstacle.

This method eliminates those obstacles. For safety reasons, volunteers are sent out in teams of two to teach people English, but it helps those people become more active members of the community.

“They are comfortable in their own home. And they may say ‘Can my son or neighbor come to the class?’ It’s a great way to have community. We want to give back and are all about building community,” Duran said.

The vision for this church started to take shape years ago. When Duran moved to Springfield, he felt a lack of resources and outreach to multi-ethnic communities.

So he and his wife and cluster of friends started dreaming of launching an intercultural church. The six friends began to meet in each other’s homes to worship.

When Life360 Vision Pastor Ted Cederblom learned about Duran’s informal intercultural worship, Cederblom approached him about founding a site within the Life360 network.

Duran is excited about the official launch and says the response to the church has been so positive.

“I think because the uniqueness of reaching out to the multi-ethnic community people are catching the vision,” Duran said.

Want to go?

Life360 Intercultural Church will officially launch at 5 p.m. Oct. 17 at its new church home, 1349 W. Meadowmere St. Saturday services always start with a meal and fellowship. The gatherings are informal and casual. Members also meet at 7 p.m. Wednesdays at the same location for church service. If you have questions, contact damon@life360.org