Interview with Pastor Fernando Lammoglia

As part of our Daring Faith campaign, we want to fill God’s house with 40,000 worshipers at our weekend services by the year 2020. Part of meeting this goal means launching new campuses and expanding our reach to more communities. Stepping up to help fulfill this initiative is Fernando Lammoglia, the new pastor of our Saddleback Español campus.  

Slated to launch in spring 2017, the Spanish-speaking campus will be located at Saddleback Lake Forest. Services will be held in the afternoon, allowing for the Español campus to grow into its unique identity within the Saddleback Church family.

“We are convinced that God is the one orchestrating this initiative to help us fulfill our Daring Faith goal,” says Pastor Fernando. “We also believe that this Latino campus will help us live out our value of being an all-nations congregation in even more palpable ways.”

Originally from Venezuela, Fernando has many years of ministry experience including six years as a youth pastor and two years as an associate pastor. As an ideal fit for Saddleback, he also assisted in regional and national church-planting efforts in Venezuela, while his wife Celsa remained actively involved in missions. As a gifted vocalist, Celsa has dedicated over 10 years to leading worship—a talent she hopes to share with the new Saddleback Español campus.

According to Fernando, God has been preparing them for this move ever since they began attending Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in 2010. After he earned a Masters in Divinity, and Celsa worked toward a Masters of Arts in Church Music, they placed their focus on serving Hispanic ministries.

“This allowed us to learn about the cultural diversity of Hispanics in the US, which in turn helped us to learn effective ways to reach the Latino community for Christ,” recalls Fernando. “I believe that our gifting and experience will be useful for this new endeavor in starting a Saddleback Español campus.”

For the young couple, there was no question that God wanted them to take on this new role. Passionate about reaching people for Christ, they both felt a strong calling to come to Saddleback, and recognized the ready harvest in Orange County.

Following God’s will did not come without its challenges. Accepting the Saddleback position meant they had to sacrifice living near their families and moving to California where they didn’t know a single person. It also meant that Celsa could not finish her degree at Southwestern Seminary, and would need to transfer her credits to a school in California. Yet convinced that God was calling them in that direction, the Lammoglias took their biggest step of faith.

“It was actually quite amazing the way God showed up,” explains Fernando. “Throughout the interview process with Saddleback, God continued to open doors. After six months of prayer and conversations, we knew for sure that this was the right step for us. It was impressive to see that God was really speaking to us and pointing us in this direction, even from very early in the process.”

Now as the couple prepares for the new campus launch, they are already putting plans into place to make Saddleback Español a strong influence among the Hispanic community in Orange County. They envision impacting young Latino families by meeting their needs in practical ways, and in turn, sharing God’s love, hope, and message.

Among their goals are to build a healthy Purpose Driven campus that touches a generation of the Latino community, and shapes them into mature disciples. In the long term, they want this first regional Latino campus to become a hub and a model for doing ministry among the Hispanics throughout the United States.

Above all, Fernando and his wife are excited about partnering with God to reach more people for Christ, and potentially bring thousands of Hispanics into a relationship with him.

As the Lammoglias take this bold step of faith, they humbly ask that the whole Saddleback family begins to pray and seek God to direct their every move, every initiative, and every idea for this new campus. They trust that God will use them within Orange Country, as a tool to bring Hispanics to a place of community with Christ, and to a position of membership in the Saddleback family.

As Fernando says, “We live in a county where nearly half of the population is Hispanic, and the vast majority are not yet in a relationship with God and his church. That means hundreds of thousands of Latinos are without the peace of God in their lives, and they’re living right beside us. Therefore, this is a task that will require all of us to help. So we ask you to join us in asking God: ‘Father, here I am. What can I do to help?’”

For more information about our upcoming campus launches, contact Pastor of New Campus Launches, kyungl@saddleback.com.