Eric Fillinger's Blog

Brian’s Baptism

Eric Fillinger — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 18:17:24 +0000

From Acts Chapter 2:
36 “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Messiah.”
37 When the people heard this, they were cut to the heart and said to Peter and the other apostles, “Brothers, what shall we do?”
38 Peter replied, “Repent and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins. And you will receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. 39 The promise is for you and your children and for all who are far off—for all whom the Lord our God will call.”
40 With many other words he warned them; and he pleaded with them, “Save yourselves from this corrupt generation.” 41 Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day.

Brian accepted the message about Jesus and it was my joy and privilege to baptize him into Christ Jesus. It was great to welcome Brian into God’s family and call him a brother in Christ!

What I Like About Hope

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 30 Nov 2011 22:35:40 +0000

Recently our church, Hope Christian Church, held a block party at a nearby park. During the event, I interviewed some Hope people and asked them what they liked about our church. A common reply was that people like the diversity they find at Hope and the implicit grace required to foster diversity. We have a document the church uses called “Hope Family Expectations”. This document outlines some core values that are the DNA of our church. This is one section from it: A COMMITMENT TO DIVERSITY – As Covenant Family, I understand that the world is diverse, Heaven will be diverse and each Church ought to reflect its community. Therefore, I will extend grace, work to create a come-as-you-are culture and foster a sense of belonging for all people, regardless of past experiences or present realities.

Watch this video to see what people like about Hope.

Taste of the Nations

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 17:43:25 +0000

As a Church family, we are committed to the biblical value of diversity. The world is diverse and heaven will be diverse. The Church depicted in the book of Acts reflected the diversity of its community. Given this, we want Hope Christian Church to be a Church where we extend grace, work to create a come-as-you-are culture and foster a sense of belonging for all people, regardless of past experiences or present realities. To further this purpose, we shared a meal together that we called, Taste of the Nations. We did this because at Hope, we have five different ethnicities, and at least eight distinct cultures in the church. Sharing a meal together was a great way to celebrate our diversity. Our dinner helped us to know one another better and try some foods that many people had never tried before.

Pack, Move, Unpack!

Eric Fillinger — Mon, 05 Sep 2011 18:55:01 +0000

Hebrews 12:1 directs followers of Jesus to “throw off everything that hinders”. We decided that owning a home was a hindrance to doing and being all that God wanted from us. So, we decided to downsize and sell our house. We were planning to be renters again, but the timing of the Halls leaving coincided with our decision to move. We packed up our four bedroom house, with ample storage space and moved into a three bedroom house with less storage space. This move into the house that Hope rents will benefit us and the Church, because once our house sells, I will be able to reduce my salary. We are doing everything we can to ensure that Hope is established as a self-supporting church.

The boys are sharing a room together again. My office (the 3rd bedroom) is also storage for most of the things that Hope owns. The new house is definitely smaller, but it really is enough space and significantly bigger and nicer than what most people in the world live in. A broader perspective from visits to countries like Venezuela and Mexico helps me to keep in check what I need to live.

Packing is terrible. Moving is horrible. This is our fifth move in a little over four years. I don’t want to move again for a very, very long time. We made a concerted effort to get things unpacked as quickly as possible. We’ve done well. Everything is unpacked and in its place. The only thing that remains to do is hang pictures on the walls. Our old house is a different story. We have some cosmetic projects like painting and landscaping to complete before we can put the house on the market. My goal is to have the house on the market by mid-October.

The exterior shots of the new house show that we are right beside the church building. Jennifer wanted the world to see the box mountain that she created during the unpacking process.

Blogging Takes Time

Eric Fillinger — Sat, 06 Aug 2011 18:57:41 +0000

Blogging takes time. Blogging requires that I have time and energy to write. Both of these come when a person has margin. At this time, I have no margin. I know it’s not good and it’s not what I want life to be like. I’m taking the steps to regain some margin, but this will take a few months to be completed. So, for this season of no-margin, I will simply observe the difficulty of blogging without margin.

Goodbye and Hello

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 18:36:40 +0000

June was a time of transition for Hope Christian Church. We said goodbye to Chris & Beth, then said hello to Javier and Erik. Chris served as the youth & worship minister for about a year before leaving to join the staff of a church plant in Buffalo, NY. Chris did a great job for us and we’re sad to see him and Beth leave so soon. We don’t like it, but we understand that God has called them to something new. Something that is the alignment of their passion and gifts.

Javier and Erik have both been part of the Hope family for many months and involved in different ministries of the church. So, it was an easy decision for me to ask each of them to serve as ministry interns for the church. Javier now has the responsibility of leading our worship band. Erik now has the responsibility of leading our youth ministry. God provided leaders for Hope who love Him, love people and love New Orleans. A difficult transition has been made pretty easy by a God who is faithful to see His Church established in New Orleans.

Avryl’s Baptism

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 17:29:01 +0000

I was super excited to have the honor and joy of baptizing Arvyl into Christ Jesus. She was ready to be fully committed to following Jesus. You can watch the of her confession and baptism in her apartment pool. We weren’t the only ones in the pool that afternoon. People told me latter that during the baptism everyone in the pool got quiet and paid attention to what we were doing. I know this is true, because about an hour later these teens and young adults were “baptizing” each other in the pool. Our testimony was out there for them to see, what they do with it and Jesus is up to them and will be between them and the Lord.

2011 Day Camp

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 17:00:22 +0000

We weren’t able to have Fun Fridays this summer due to the lack of availability of volunteers. So, we have a week-long Day Camp. It went great. Each of day was a lot of fun in the spirit of Fun Fridays. Because it all took place in the same week, we were able to do some things like theme days and an offering that we could not do previously with Fun Fridays. Our 24 campers raised over $300.00 for the Center of Hope, which provides emergency housing for homeless families, women and men. You can use this link to view pictures from each day on our Facebook page.

Levee Sledding

Eric Fillinger — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 16:52:26 +0000

Our Life Group wanted to do something fun together, so we decided to have a “watermelon party” at the lakefront. As we planned, one long-time New Orleans resident suggested that we bring some cardboard with us so that we could sled down the levee. When I lived in Ohio, I could sled down steep hills on snow, which is a lot of fun. The steepest hill in New Orleans is the levee. There is no snow, so we used a big piece of cardboard on the grass. The video shows our attempts at levee sledding. It’s not the thrill of sledding in the snow, but it did provide for some good laughs.

Tangible Kingdom Conclusion

Eric Fillinger — Tue, 14 Jun 2011 15:40:54 +0000

The premise behind the Tangible Kingdom message series was to understand better what it means to be the Church and to see God’s Kingdom be made real in us and made real in the world through us. With this in mind, we did a lot to engage our community through our presence and our service. We held some of our small group Bible studies at coffee shops. We held a yard sale with donated items and then gave 100% of the money raised to the Salvation Army Center of Hope. The Center of Hope provides emergency housing to families and single women and men in New Orleans. (pictures below of the yard sale)

We concluded our message series by being as publicly engaged as a Church as we could. We held our worship service in City Park, near a popular kids play area. After the worship service, we ate a meal together and then threw a party for everyone in our area of the park. We brought the grill and gave out hundreds for free hot dogs. We set up two of our inflatable bounce houses for the kids to jump in. It was a fun way to communicate God’s love and be a blessing to those in the park that evening. Hopefully, people are thinking a little differently about what it means to be the Church. (pictures below from the worship service and party)