Participant FAQ

In a broad sense, Freedom Session is for everyone and a critical part of one’s discipleship journey.

During FOUNDATIONS and Authentic Living, we deal with low self esteem, perfectionism and fear of failure, pornography / sexual addiction, food addiction and eating disorders, depression, scars from sexual / physical abuse, guilt and shame and that haunting feeling that something is missing.

Freedom Session is equally appropriate for those who grew up in the church as it is for those without previous Christian experience.  Ethnicity and social-economic status are non-issues.  Emotional pain, patterns of escape and false belief systems affect us all.

However, there are a few groups of people we encourage to obtain advisement from a medical professional before registering:

• those under the care of a psychologist or psychiatrist
• those with brain injuries or significant mental illness
• those with significant learning challenges

First of all, Freedom Session is not a recovery program. It’s a healing-discipleship program and both our goals and process are significantly different. Our goal is freedom and healing which, in our experience, is a much greater goal than recovery.

Furthermore. traditional 12 Step recovery programs ask people to turn their life and will over to a god of their understanding and refer to this god as a higher power. Freedom Session is based on a solid conviction that Jesus Christ is God, the Highest Power and the only one who can heal our hearts, transform our lives and set us free from our unhealthy behaviours, bitterness or addictions.

Freedom Session does not ask participants to identify themselves by their own sin, flaws, past (for example, “My name is Jim and I am an alcoholic”) or the sins/flaws of another (for example, “My name is Alexis and I am a survivor of sexual abuse”). Freedom Session takes people on a much deeper journey than most 12-step programs because it’s focused on healing the heart.

Twelve-step programs are most commonly attended by people with addictions or compulsive behaviors. Freedom Session is for everyone, including church leaders! Visionary pastors are taking their entire church leadership and staff through the program and changing the DNA of their local church.

There are the three elements that typically occur in a Freedom Session experience.

• Large group teaching where participants gather together to absorb teaching from the Freedom Session author by video
• The small group experience is strategically designed for participants to interact with the teaching and explore how the teaching applies to their lives
• Taking steps towards freedom is the weekly homework assignment, an essential part of Freedom Session that takes one or two hours each week

Yes. However, to have the best possible Freedom Session experience, we still recommend participants take the journey with others.

Freedom Session FOUNDATIONS is a 20-week healing-discipleship journey with an eight-week follow-up course called Authentic Living.

Most Freedom Session groups require participants to purchase the FOUNDATIONS I & II workbooks and commit to the full 20 weeks which includes a weekly homework assignment. Many host churches invite you to attend the first session with no obligation and make your decision after your initial experience.

Authentic Living is strongly recommended but optional. 

Here is what we typically find, supposing a launch of 40 participants.

During the first two weeks, participants grow by 20%.
Once participants fully realize the homework commitment, there is often a 5-10% drop.
During FOUNDATIONS II – Finding Freedom, there may be another 5-10% attrition, primarily from those who fall behind in their homework

The greatest factor in participant retention is the authenticity and commitment of the Freedom Session facilitator during FOUNDATIONS I and the development of trust in the group.

In healthy Freedom Session groups, about 80% complete FOUNDATIONS I & II and about 65% of the initial group also complete Authentic Living.

Yes. You can visit our store and get access to our “Taste of Freedom Session” sampler. But the best way is to make the investment of a FS Workbook Set and begin watching the Teaching Videos. We are now giving free access to the teaching videos because we want to remove anything we can that stands in the way of your freedom and healing.

Freedom Session directors place participants in small groups based on a number of factors. There are no guarantees that participants will be placed in the same group as their friends.

In general, Freedom Session small groups range between three and nine participants.

Once participants complete Freedom Session FOUNDATIONS, they are strongly encouraged to take Authentic Living where they apply the principles they used to process their past in their present and future.

After Authentic Living, we suggest interested small groups or FS3 Triads continue to meet for an additional three months for support and accountability using the Authentic Life Journal as a guide.  Some Triads have continued to meet for as long as ten years.

Freedom Session FOUNDATIONS and Authentic Living materials can be purchased online in the United States and Canada.

If you are taking Freedom Session in a local church, you can purchase the workbooks from the church.

Please visit our online store for current prices.

Yes. See our Freedom Session store for details.

Freedom Session is designed and intended for adults, those 19 years and older. The youngest Freedom Session grad we have personally seen is 17 and the oldest is 84. 

While some of the Freedom Session exercises have been used effectively with youth under parental or professional counseling supervision, neither FOUNDATIONS or Authentic Living are considered youth programs.