Peachtree gets a new pastor

Newsboy photo/ Sharon Kerr JARED HOLLIER is eager to join the Jasper community and the families he serves at Peachtree Baptist Church.Wife Elizabeth Hollier must complete her contract with the Lumberton schools before looking for a teaching position here.

After a year without a full-time pastor, Peachtree Baptist Church has a new pastor, Jared Hollier.

Hollier is a 2002 graduate of Vidor High School who says he felt the call to the ministry while a still a senior. He attended East Texas Baptist College in Marshall, where he met and married his wife Elizabeth, now a school teacher.

"I came from a church family," Hollier said. "My dad was a construction foreman and my mom was the church secretary for more than 25 years, so I was always real involved with the church growing up."

While in school in Marshall, he served as a youth minister. After graduation, he says he traveled all summer, filling in as a pastor at various churches and revivals everywhere he could. He came to Jasper to serve as interim pastor in December.

"They liked us and we liked them," Hollier said. He agreed to stay, and says his first order of business is to meet the members and build relationships in the church community.

On a typical Sunday, 75-85 people from a 10-miles radius attend services. The church is located seven miles northwest of Jasper off U.S. Highway 63.

Hollier has a lot of plans for the future. He'd like to see the church sponsor a big children's event for Easter. He spent last weekend helping with a blood drive for a boy with bone cancer.

Hollier says he enjoys camping, fishing and hunting, so he's looking forward to living this close to the lakes. He plays guitar in a praise and worship band in Buna, where the couple currently resides.

Elizabeth Hollier is currently teaching fourth grade in Lumberton, but the couple plans to move to Jasper as soon as her contract is complete.

"We're looking forward to being here," Hollier said. "There's no substitute for a church family. It's so neat when you have something great to share that you have that family, and when something terrible happens, those people are there to help you through it. It just amazes me that God wired us to do life with other people and be a part of something bigger than our own little world. Everybody needs that kind of community."