“THE RIGHT PEOPLE TOGETHER IN THE RIGHT PLACE”
New Wine Christian Fellowship
St. John Parish, after Hurricane Ida
“They said, ‘Pastor, is there anything you can do to help us?’” he explains. “They had nowhere to go. And so that night—midnight—on August 29, I drove to our facilities. There were no lights. Water everywhere. I opened our facility so that rescue vehicles could bring people who were being rescued out of their attics, rescued out of their homes. They brought them here, and we gave them a place of shelter.” The night Hurricane Ida hit, members of the St. John the Baptist Parish government called Pastor Neil Bernard. Their buildings were damaged, and they asked Pastor Bernard if his church, the New Wine Christian Fellowship, had any space. The parish government knew to call Pastor Bernard in a crisis—he’s a community leader, and his congregation has focused on service since they launched in his living room in 1995. The church had a clear philosophy from the start.