Belief series: Evangelical; E-Free

The E-Free Church of America stands tall and proud on the hill it was built upon, with Pastor Doug Birky leading Sunday worship.

He grew up surrounded by Evangelical beliefs, “it was referred to as a Bible church, it was nondenominational, but it was still a very Evangelical Bible teaching, Bible believing church.

“I was raised in that kind of church atmosphere. My parents were both Christian, and at a very young age I made a decision, I trusted the Lord Jesus Christ as my savior.”

Pastor Birky said he was about 8-years-old when he came to this decision, and was “actually in Sunday School when that happen, and the Sunday School teacher helped me receive Christ as my savior.

“But really as a boy I just had what I would say was a real sense or a calling to have God in my life to become a pastor or a preacher. So as far back as I can remember I’ve always had a desire to be in ministry.”

Part of this thought process could have been because his family was devout in attendance of church. “We didn’t miss a Sunday. We were there every Wednesday night and throughout the week we were involved in church activities, so it was always a part of my life growing up.”

However, he said the calling to be a part of ministry stayed with him even through his teen and young adult years; the sense of what he had to do with his life was always clear – it was to spread God’s word.

He even attended an evangelical based college, Wheaton College, it was then he began youth ministry, Youth for Christ and music ministry.

A running joke for him is that he told God many times over he “would do anything for him but become a pastor”, because he felt it to be a bit dull in comparison to the other works he was involved in.

“Finally, the Lord God made that circle smaller and smaller until I decided that is what he’s made me to do. And it came to the point where I decided, you know what, there is nothing else I would rather do, at that point I went on to seminary,” Birky explained.

He attended the Dallas Theological Seminary, in Dallas, and said it was yet another very strong evangelical school, at the age of 32.

It was right after he graduated from seminary school that he found himself on his way to Sidney, to oversee – the church itself having been built only three years prior.

“They were looking for their first full time pastor after a church plant pastor had been here,” Pastor said, “and we had contact with the church.”

Like most people neither his wife nor he knew where Sidney, Nebraska was and had to look it up on a map to see where it was they would be going – especially since he wanted to become involved with an E-free Church.

Pastor Birky and his wife fell in love with the people and area quickly he said and became as excited as the congregation was to find his home within the E-Free church in Sidney – 26 years ago.

Contrary to belief, Pastor Birky said, “the Evangelical Free church is a denomination.

“A lot of people think it’s maybe just an independent church or set of churches, it is a denomination, maybe a little more loosely than some denominations, but that is just in terms of their view of authority within the church. It’s (E-Free) what I call kind of a bottom up instead of a top down hierarchy.”

In other words, Christ is the head of all churches and the congregation is the “governing body” – leaving the authority over decisions made within the church to its people.

“The denominational name is the Evangelical Free Church of America, but every Evangelical Free Church is a part of that denomination. We have to subscribe to the statement of faith they have, it is a 10 point statement of faith, if you will, which are the basic doctrines that we hold on to,” Pastor Birky began.

“We have a lot more beliefs within our individual church as and a lot more doctrines we would hold to and not that every E-Free church agrees with every doctrine but those 12 are what make us E-Free Churches.

“But at the same time it would be very similar to many other churches, such as your Southern Baptist churches or a non-denominational Bible church,” as he said he grew up in. “You hear of community churches and things like that, we would be very, very similar to lots of those groups.”

Pastor Birky claimed that if another pastor from one of the denominations he named were to look at the followings of his congregation they would more than likely agree with much of what the doctrine said, but as with all beliefs not completely.

The fundamentals for E-Free Church is to be “evangelical and very clearly we hold number one to the authority of God’s word. That is the top of the list. In other words we believe the bible is the word of God.”

Birky said “The scriptures in terms of their original language, which we have translated over the centuries, as given to us, are the authoritative word of God.They don’t somehow become the word of God, they don’t contain the word of God, and all of it is the word of God. As Evangelicals we would say it is without error, we believe in a doctrine of inerrancy, which says that it is all true even the parts I don’t understand are still true.”

Pastor Birky said even all the Bible stories in accordance to the E-Free doctrine are believed to be true, because Jesus confirmed the truth in them and therefore the ‘interpretation’ of the Bible is not needed.

The E-Free doctrine also states that the member has to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

“I’m not born an Evangelical, I’m not born a Christian, and the scriptures say I am born a sinner, separated from God, alienated from him that is what the book (Bible) teaches. So at some point in my life I have to come to a decision, like I did when I was 8-years-old,” Pastor said.

He said just because he grew up in a Christian church, his faith states he had to make the choice to be a Christian and have a personal relationship with Jesus once that person understands – no matter the age.

A similarity between the E-Free members and other Christian beliefs is that they too believe in being born again, said Pastor Birky, in order to be Christian.

He said this belief is born of the words Jesus used, “You must be born again.”

According to Pastor Birky, to the E-Free congregation member baptism means two things: “a public statement of my faith to Christ” and “a picture of death, burial and resurrection,” much like Jesus Christ on the cross.

Baptism is a direct order from Jesus, but it has to be what he called a “believer’s baptism.

“A person should be baptized once they have made a personal choice to follow Jesus Christ,” Pastor said quoting several scriptures as to how it falls under Jesus’s order.

Therefore the decision to be baptized should be left to a person old enough to make it and understand the decision being made, according to Birky, therefore infant baptisms are not done.

Pastor Birky said they recognize it is not baptism that saves people but rather a “public statement of their faith in Christ.”

Being Evangelical also means, according to Pastor Birky, to “be committed to evangelism.”

He said sharing the gospel and word of God is extremely important, again taking this belief back to the words Jesus spoke prior to ascending into heaven, “make disciples of all nations.”

Therefore, to be Evangelical it is necessary to share the word of God and Jesus with “the entire world” and to teach that “there is no other gospel and no other way to heaven or eternal life except through Jesus Christ.

“Evangelicals with great humility take the gospel to the world saying this is the only way, this is the truth, with the idea of seeing people turn from false religions to the one and only God through the one and only savior, Jesus Christ.”

The free part of E-Free is tied to the congregational governing body, according to Birky.

This is due to each church being ruled or having Jesus Christ as the head of the Church – “so we answer to him rather than a denomination.”

Belonging to a denomination is more of a way for the churches – E-free or Evangelical – to come together to use as a tool in helping in missionary works, or if there is a problem in which a pastor has encountered or just to be there to help out by bouncing ideas off one another to bring together a unity of sorts, but according to Birky it is the congregation who has final say in how their church is run.