Non-denominational Neighbors

Neighbors Church

Contact: 4672 35th St, San Diego info@sdneighbors.church www.sdneighbors.church

Membership: 150

Lead Pastor: Dan Braga (and Alexa Braga)  

Age: 46

Born: Gooding, ID

Formation: Western Seminary, Portland, OR

Years Ordained: 24

San Diego Reader: What is your favorite subject on which to preach?

Pastor Dan Braga: The reuniting of heaven with earth. It addresses the hopes of every human being on this planet—the restoration of all wrongs made right. In general, I would summarize this point by saying that we at Neighbors model and follow the life of Jesus Christ. If there was a center point for this, it would be the Sermon on the Mount.

SDR: What is your main concern as member of the clergy?

PB: God’s people do not truly know and experience themselves as loved by God. We can have an intellectual assent or knowledge—“Jesus loves me so because the Bible tells me so”—type of stuff, but I don’t think they have an experiential, transformative knowledge of God’s love that radically reshapes the way they live their lives. We base our church around nine different practices that embody the beliefs we hold in our heads and get them into our hearts.

SDR: Why non-denominational?

PB: I come from a Calvary Chapel background and for many years I was in a network of reformed churches in Seattle—for about 11 years. So, the church that planted us was non-denominational; that’s how we were born.

SDR: What is the mission of your church?

PB: We exist to be with Jesus, become like Jesus, and do what Jesus did. When I was considering names for this church—this is my third church plant—I woke up one morning and thought that this could be a church where my neighbors could come and learn about Jesus, where my neighbors could feel comfortable, a place where they would feel welcomed and learn and grow. Of course, Jesus’ command to love God with all your mind, heart and strength of soul and to love your neighbor as yourself was a nice capstone from the Lord on our name. We look at all of life as a discipleship. Every facet of the human experience and human endeavor as a Christian is done in apprenticeship to Jesus.

SDR: What one book has had the greatest impact on your ministry?

PB: The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky. Ivan’s rant—How can God be good in such a world of suffering and evil?—is so raw and real and really addresses the human experience in a way that I have a hard time getting through every time I read it. Ivan unloads and it is what the modern human, especially young Christians, are dealing with—and Dostoevsky puts words to it.

SDR: Where do you go when you die?

PB: We experience a recreated, restored cosmos. Heaven comes to earth and when we die, we go to this intermittent stage until life after life after death occurs. We’re waiting for the resurrected body, a literal, corporal, touchable, tangible body and a new creation where there will be no death and no wrong any longer. The soul who says I want to be with Jesus will be with Jesus; but those who don’t, won’t. That’s the easiest way to talk about what has been traditionally called eternal judgment: each human gets what they most desire at their core. Hell is a complex topic: it exists but I’m uncertain as to how it unfolds in light of a loving God who is merciful.