The Family of God: Experiencing Church as Family

For over a decade Pastor Jason Lomelino has led a family of believers, mostly college students and young adults under the age of thirty. Isla Vista Church is located in an infamous party town adjacent to the University of California, Santa Barbara. Each week this church family has guided a movement of volunteers known as Jesus Burgers, which gathers weekly to serve burgers to the hundreds of partiers walking down a street full of house parties.

“I see today’s generation—those of our church and those we reach out to in our community—as hungry for family, community, and life together,” says Lomelino. “Young people will spend hours upon hours on social media longing to connect with, and feel a part of, something greater than themselves. Our church has become a family, and we want to testify to God’s work in us.”

The Family of God is coauthored by Jason Lomelino and Lucas Bell and is interspersed with stories from the church family. Together they provide a unique insight into four core foundations of the Isla Vista Church.

These core foundations are presented in the four sections of this book:

• Community Living
• Fathering and Mothering
• Bonding Through Battle
• Fostering Champions

Using these principles, lives are transformed through church becoming a family. This guidebook offers church families, large and small, insight into young people and their modern ways of connecting using traditional wisdom.