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Note from the Pastor, May 1, 2016

A History of Hope Fellowship, Chapter 5: The Growing Years

  A new facility will attract people to check out a church. But it is the worship, preaching and hospitality that turn guests into family members. The combination of these things brought numerical and spiritual growth as more and more people began to call Hope Fellowship their spiritual home.
  It was always our vision to design a building that would serve the entire community. The Life Care Centre became our first tenant. A group home, a Spanish church and a day care also began to rent space. Soon our busy weekly schedule was stretched to the limit by the addition of Family Conferences, dance recitals, music recitals, and concerts. The Canada Nuclear Safety Commission even rented our church for their hearings, an event that was crashed by nine Green Peace protesters, of whom four chained themselves to the tables reserved for the members of the panel. Our police force was patient and the hearings resumed peacefully after the protesters were safely stowed in the paddy wagon.
  The sign proclaiming our name also attracted people. The word “Hope” is a magnet and many have come because that is exactly what they were looking for. One woman said, “I was on my way to a bar when I saw the sign. I chose ‘Hope’ instead.”
  The realization that two other area Christian Reformed churches also had “Hope” in their names prompted us to consider a name change. We invited suggestions and took the three top choices to the public, asking shoppers to state their preference. The overwhelming majority chose Hope Fellowship because “we all need hope.” After receiving this confirmation, we began publishing the weekly Hopeful Story that has become a regular feature in our bulletin.
  As we grew, we began to publicly express our desire to become more diverse, inviting people to see Hope Fellowship as “the hope of a multi-racial, multi-national, multi-generational, multi-ability church.” This often repeated phrase became a self-fulfilling prophecy. The decision to rent a hot tub once a year and baptize people by immersion, even inviting those baptized as infants to have their baptisms “re-affirmed” if they wished, made room for the various church backgrounds that now make up our fellowship. For occasional disagreements and conflict, we introduced restorative justice circles. Not everyone stayed after checking us out. No single church can meet everybody’s needs or expectations. But many people joined.
  The Growing Years also saw more and more people serve the Lord in various ministries. Every summer our youth group served children and teens in Toronto’s Jane and Finch neighbourhoods. Our GEMS and BROS clubs collected coats for needy families and basic necessities for newborns in Haiti. And when an earthquake hit that poverty-stricken country in 2010, a benefit concert and special offerings raised tens of thousands of dollars for the survivors.
  Amidst the growth there was another painful loss. In 2011, Hope Fellowship was plunged into grief by a tragedy that hit our church family like an earthquake. Jeff’s unexpected, tragic death devastated his family and our world. We still deeply miss this young husband, father and leader.
  That same year, Service Saturdays were officially launched. A Community Opportunity Scan put us in touch with the other thirteen churches in Courtice and got us walking the streets and praying through the neighbourhoods. Our first bi-annual women’s conference drew 70 women. And our second soldier – Ed being the first; Michael being the second – returned home safely from a tour of duty in Afghanistan.
  After so much growth, it was time to take a breath and make sure that we were firmly centred in the will of God. And so the Growing Years blossomed into the Focusing Years.
- Pastor Peter

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