Our History
In its infancy, the Hosanna worshipers met regularly in a conference room at the Holiday Inn on Highway 190. Each Sunday our organist loaded his home organ in the back of a pickup truck and carted it to the Inn. Other members designed and built a portable altar and baptismal font to be used in the worship services. April 1, 1984, Hosanna was able to rent a small office complex on Highway 22 which gave room for a small multi-purpose sanctuary, an office/study for the pastor, a kitchen, one classroom and a restroom. Members considered this a great blessing as it met their needs for 3 years. During these years, we grew from 74 to 124 members which enabled us to build on our Hwy 190 service road site.
On March 29, 1987, the first worship service was celebrated by 169 people in our first building. In 1988, the Hosanna Rose Window was completed by Dr. Richard Oster (a charter member) and dedicated to the glory of God. As our membership and attendance increased we found it necessary to hold three worship services on Sunday mornings.
On June 6, 2005 we moved to a new, much bigger site! With 438 members and 94 non-members who regularly worshiped with us, the time was more than right. Our new facility on Hwy 190 in Mandeville between the post office and the East Causeway Approach was filled with ministries and activities for all ages and interests.
Our first worship service in our new home was on June 19, 2005. The Dedication Service was on August 21, 2005.
Like many faith communities, Hosanna felt profoundly the effects of the COVID pandemic and the volatility it caused on national and local levels. As a result of these events, Hosanna’s membership and participation fell significantly. In 202, we made the faithful decision to sell our building in Mandeville and accepted the invitation to nest with our siblings in Christ at Covington Presbyterian Church.
With the assistance of our Texas-Louisiana Gulf Coast Synod Mission Table, Hosanna chose to enter a “redevelopment” process. During this time of redevelopment, we spent three years discerning God’s renewed call for us and how best to live out that call. We (re) discovered our core value of generosity, and following Jesus’ call, we decided to “double-down” on that core value. Instead of purchasing a new building, we decided to take to heart Jesus’ words in Matthew 16:24-26: “Then Jesus told his disciples, ‘If any wish to come after me, let them deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it. For what will it profit them if they gain the whole world but forfeit their life? Or what will they give in return for their life?’”
We found our identity in the love and teachings of Jesus, not a building. We’ve formed a long-term partnership with Covington Presbyterian Church and are building community together.
The blessings of this relationship are many. We work together along with many other faith communities, in many ministries, most notably our Hosanna Hot Meals and our Quilting ministries. We occasionally worship together, during Lent and Holy Week, on Christmas Eve, and in a Worship on the Lawn fall service on Reformation Sunday. We celebrate our shared theologies, and at the same time, maintain our own identity as Hosanna Lutheran and Covington Presbyterian churches.
We have also established a grant program called EXALT which seeks to use our resources from the sale of our former building, to support underserved communities within Western St Tammany Parish. We are excited about this program and look forward to seeing what God will do through us! We are smaller, but we are focused on our core values of generosity and love of both God and neighbor.
