Email: hollar76@yahoo.com

Rev. Eric Hollar began his ministry among us on November 23, 2008, as our Associate Pastor of Outreach.

Pastor Eric is passionate about life because he realizes he has a God who is passionate about him.

Pastor Eric grew up at Bethel and graduated from Bunker Hill High School in 1995. From there he went onto Valparaiso University (Hail Crusaders!) where he studied Theology and minored in Classics. While there God made it clear to him through various experiences, including the death of his best friend - Kyle Carson - that full-time ministry is where he needed to be. 

So, in the Fall of '99, he began attending Concordia Seminary St. Louis, MO. While studying and digging deeper into God's Word, a friend at the seminary introduced him to Corinna Malenke. They dated long-distance (from St. Louis to NC; then Warner Robins, GA o NC) for 19 months. At the end of his vicarage (internship), on August 10, 2002, they were married at Bethel.

In May of 2003, Pastor Eric received his first Call into the ministry to Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd in Biloxi, MS where he served until returning to Bethel in 2008.  During his ministry there he was blessed with lots of ministry opportunities that included working with some wonderful people at Good Shepherd as well as in the community through his work as a Chaplain to the Biloxi High Football Team and Good Shepherd's extensive Disaster Response Ministry in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina in 2005.

Pastor Eric's responsibilities at Bethel are some of the traditional preaching and teaching opportunities as well as leading the congregation in their outreach and missions.  He has been blessed to be a volunteer coach for the BHHS Football team and the Boys and Girls Basketball teams as well as serves as the Fellowship of Christian Athletes coordinator at BHHS. In addition, Pastor Eric leads Bethel's disaster response ministries aka "Bethel's Chainsaw Ministry" and their missions to Haiti.  

While the above appears to be a lot of ministry activity - his passion is to encourage people to simply live love(d).  In other words, live as you are loved by Jesus(because you are!) and share that love with all you meet.  He attempts to model this through all does, especially as a husband to Corinna and father to Moriah, Christiana, and Carson.

To God be the glory!