NEW ORLEANS – Five churches in BAGNO – Baptist Association of Greater New Orleans – started meeting again Feb. 12.
By Karen L. Willoughby
Managing editor
NEW ORLEANS – Five churches in BAGNO – Baptist
Association of Greater New Orleans – started meeting again Feb. 12.
That’s especially heartening news after you’ve
watched the director of missions mark out 54 congregations in the
associational directory that have not been able to regroup since the
triple whammy of Katrina, Rita and levee ruptures.
St. Bernard Baptist, Chalmette First Baptist and
Arabi First Baptist met for a joint service in the Chalmette High
School cafeteria, with music provided by Celebration Church. About 180
attended.
About 60 attended Poydras Baptist on the first Sunday they were able to get into their fellowship hall.
I chose to attend Edgewater Baptist Church because
not only were they meeting for their first post-Katrina Sunday morning
worship, they were welcoming the arrival of their new pastor from
Denver, Colo., Kevin Lee.
Edgewater met in a white, two-pole tent on their
parking lot in the hard-hit Gentilly section of New Orleans. Like a
wallflower at a party, the church’s gutted brick building hovered
silently at the edge of activity.
The church, minus its steeple, looked substantial on
the outside, but inside was concrete and 2×4 studs, plus an incongruous
dewdrop chandelier in the main sanctuary; it glinted of gold and glass
in the morning sunlight.
About 50 people gathered for the service, including
a half-dozen firefighters from Indianapolis – in town to help out other
first responders who had not yet found time to work on their own homes.
They had seen the tent earlier in the morning and came back to join us
in worship.
The tent, sawdust shavings spread earlier in the
morning by seminary students, and the “old” kind of folding metal
chairs, coupled with the excitement of starting church again – and a
new pastor! – combined to give a sense of revival excitement to the
brisk morning air.
Pastor Lee preached on Revelation 21. “He shall wipe
away every tear from their eyes …,” Lee read.
“And He who sits on the throne said, ‘Behold, I am making all
things new.”
The main point: God dwells with us. He invades the setting with His presence.
“Jesus dominated the water,” Lee preached. “The sea
was the presence of fear in the lives of people. … The reason things
are made new is that God will reside in ways He never has before.”
Two thumbs up for the pastor who got the sermon
exactly right for the occasion, and for members who don’t quit.
Next week: A small town church hidden in the hills.