Vince Antonucci on reaching people far from God
Vince Antonucci found Christ by reading the Bible after hearing two sentences from an evangelist on TV. In this interview, he shares how that journey led to planting Forefront Christian Church in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and why the church stays focused on reaching the unchurched.
- Antonucci describes how he came to faith and sensed a call to ministry.
- He explains Forefrontโs intentional approach to reaching people far from God.
- He shares the challenges and opportunities of multi-campus ministryโincluding meeting in a bar.
By Brad Dupray
Vince Antonucci found Christ very simplyโby reading the Bible. Vince heard an evangelist speak two sentences on TV and thought it was so ridiculous he decided to investigate the Bible on his own. Soon Vince became a Christian and a few short years later started Forefront Christian Church in Virginia Beach, Virginia, one of the most innovative churches in the United States. Vince holds a degree in political science and philosophy from the University of Buffalo, attended law school at the University of Illinois, and has a masterโs degree from Cincinnati Bible Seminary. Vinceโs book, I Became a Christian and All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt, will be released by Baker Books on February 1.
From unbelief to faith
Would you have called yourself an atheist?
I would say I didnโt care about God. I wouldnโt have argued that there wasnโt a God. I just never gave it much thought.
When you became a Christian did your friends think you had โgone off the deep end?โ
Yes. I became a Christian and in the summer I went back to my hometown to tell my high school friends and they all were shocked. My college friends were a little less shocked because they saw me living it out day-by-day.
A call to ministry
And then you decided to become a preacher?
As soon as I decided Christianity was true I thought, this is what I want to do with my whole life. I met with my minister and told him I thought I should become a minister because all I wanted to do was share Jesus with people. He said you can still do that through a career in law. So I went on to law school, as I had planned, but the whole time I was there I knew I was in the wrong place. So in the summer after my first year I switched to seminary.
What drives your passion for evangelism?
First, it was Jesusโ passion, and I want to be passionate for the same things that he was. Jesus would repeatedly state his mission: โI have come to seek and save the lost.โ โI have come for the sick, not the well.โ When I saw that was his passion I wanted to make it my passion too. But no one had ever told me about Jesus. I went 20 years and never heard the first thing about Jesus.
Planting Forefront Christian Church
How did Forefront get started?
The first time I heard of church planting was the year after I became a Christian. I did a law internship in Washington, D.C., and I went to the church where Brett Andrews was the associate pastor. He told me he was going to start a church. It never occurred to me that new churches were started. I just thought they were always there. Then when I went to seminary my goal was to find the best way to reach the most people for Jesus, and it turns out church planting is it.
Did you go to New Life with the intention of leaving to start a church?
I went there with the agreement that I would be there for two or three years and then would launch a new church with their help.
Were you more scared or excited when you started Forefront?
Both! I was nervous. It was new. But I was really excited and felt like it was a God thing and he was going to do something really cool.
You guys were the first โForefront.โ Where did you get the name?
I wanted a name that didnโt sound churchy. I wanted to start a church for people who donโt like church. We were having trouble coming up with a name, and I thought maybe thereโs a band that has a cool name we could use. None of the band names appealed to me, but I noticed โForefront Recordsโ on a few of my CDs, so we eventually took that name. We tell people that we want them to put God at the forefront of their lives.
Reaching the unchurched and staying focused
What makes Forefront Church unique?
Every church wants to reach lost people. Some churches donโt reach any. Itโs kind of like fishing. I could say I want to go shark fishing. I could go out to a fishing spot, use normal bait, normal poles, fish for awhile, and hope that I would catch a shark among the other fish I would catch. Or I could find out where the sharks are. I could use the kind of bait that would attract a shark, the kind of poles that would catch a shark. Some churches go out fishing and hope they might catch some lost people among everyone else who happens to come to church. We, on the other hand, are completely focused on reaching people who are far from God.
Is Forefront the church you hoped it would be?
In some ways yes, because we reach those we wanted to reach. Seventy-two percent of people who come to Forefront come from unchurched or antichurch backgrounds. We are reaching people who were very far from God. But itโs been more challenging than I would have guessed. Because of our target there are a lot of speed bumps and curves in the road that fill the journey with unexpected struggles.
For example . . .
One example would be a lack of leadership. We donโt reach people who bring a church leadership background. Another example is losing people. Remember Jesusโ Parable of the Sower? He seems to indicate that out of four people who hear Godโs Word, only one will receive it and stick with it over the long-term. When youโre reaching almost exclusively people who are far from God, you sometimes feel like that farmer throwing out seeds. And Jesusโ parable is true. No matter how good of a job you do in your ministry, youโre going to lose a lot of people
Does it annoy you when people leave because youโre not an โordinaryโ church?
Of the 28 percent who come in with church background, we lose some of them because weโre not an ordinary church. Of the 72 percent who are from an unchurched background, they love it that weโre not an ordinary church. They donโt want ordinary church! We do lose some of those people as well, but for other reasons. I think the types of reasons Jesus describes in the Parable of the Sower.
Have you had to give up anything as a church in order to have the unique vibe you have created?
I think we could be a whole lot bigger if we did church in a way that pleases as many people as possible. We lose a lot of Christians who might go away because weโre too raw or extreme. You give up offerings, because these new people will give, but it takes them awhile. You also sacrifice personal comfort, because there is a whole lot of messiness in peopleโs lives. Thatโs not a lot of fun, but if youโre going to reach people far from God, this is what you find.
So, do you do โnormal churchโ stuff?
Sure. We do Communion every week, we do offering every week. We do about 22 minutes of worship and a 35-minute sermon every week. We preach from the Bible. We do tons of foreign missions. Most of the components are there, it is just a different flavor than what any ordinary churchgoer would be used to.
Multi-campus ministry and โchurch in a barโ
How is the multicampus thing working out?
Itโs just getting started. Weโve gone from one campus to three. Two of our campuses will be meeting in high school auditoriums. The third campus will be on Tuesday night in a bar. The bar will be open for business while weโre having church in it! Part of the reason we decided on Tuesday night is that we have a lot of people trying to get their lost friends to come, but they wonโt come on Sunday mornings. Maybe their kids have soccer, or theyโre hung over from the night before, or they go to the beach on Sunday morning, or maybe they like to sleep in on the weekends. So that got us thinking about doing a different night of the week.
How did you end up at a bar?
We had a bar tell us we could meet there on Tuesday nights, since itโs typically kind of empty on Tuesday nights. So weโre going to have church in a bar. Weโre going to do our exact same service as Sunday morningโworship, Communion, sermon, offering. The ownerโs not a Christian, and heโs kind of a rough guy, with tattoos all over, but heโs totally excited about it. Weโve said weโre going to talk about sin and Hell and even occasionally the dangers of alcohol. He said, โNo problem. That sounds great to me. Iโm going to come every week!โ
Whatโs your ultimate goal for people at Forefront?
Love God, love people, turn the world upside down. We take people wherever they are and walk with them, in hopes that some day they will be lovers of God and lovers of people. People that God can use to turn the world upside down.
