After months of rebuilding following a tornado near his old church, the Rev. Neal Ooms is bonding with his new church in Hollandale.

“We’ve always been deeply involved in the community,” Ooms said. “You’re kind of a town pastor, not just a church pastor. It’s important to say hello to everybody and be available to whoever needs someone to talk to or just needs some pastoral care.”

When a pastor is looking to move to a new church or when a church is without a pastor, Ooms said it’s up to the church and pastor to find each other in the Reformed Church in America.

“It’s very much word of mouth: Contacting the office to find out who’s vacant and talking to each other. And the way we look at it is it’s God’s will that’s guiding it. God’s going to bring a pastor and church together that he wants together.”

Ooms started talking to the Hollandale Reformed Church in March of 2008, but he said the process seemed to go slowly and was often stalled. Ooms said he now believes it’s because a tornado damaged over 400 homes in Parkersburg, Iowa, on May 25, 2008. He was reverend of Hope Reformed Church in Parkersburg.

“We started talking to Hollandale last March, and things just seemed to keep getting stalled or stopped, and we were sort of wondering why. Then we said looking back it makes sense. God wanted me here (in Hollandale), but first he wanted me there for the tornado relief,” Ooms said.

He has construction experience from working on more than 25 mission trips, and he was the leader of the pastor’s association in Parkersburg, so he said it was natural for him to step in as volunteer coordinator during the relief effort.

“I was deeply involved in the tornado relief effort,” Ooms said. “I was the volunteer coordinator. I was leader of the minister’s association. Maybe the simplest way to put it is I put in almost nine months nonstop, and it was time to hand off the baton.”

He said about 4,000 volunteers came the Saturday after the tornado, and he said they estimated as many as 20,000 volunteers helped in Parkersburg between that first weekend and November when the relief ended for the winter. He said his experience with mission trips helped, because he knew what tools and equipment the volunteers would need to work effectively.

Ooms’ wife, Lynn, and daughter, Keli, ran a relief center for food, clothing and personal hygiene.

The situation in Parkersburg was difficult, and Ooms said it was a struggle for people to get through day-to-day functions. He said the town would have been in serious trouble without the help of the Red Cross and the government organizations.

“A way I’ve put it for a long time: I would never wish a tornado on any community, but since it had to happen, I wouldn’t trade what we went through working together following it for anything in the world,” Ooms said. “There’s just an experience and a bonding there that nothing compares to.”

The family’s involvement with the tornado relief made it more difficult for them to make the decision to move, but at the same time, he said it was a relief.

“We didn’t realize how tired we were,” Ooms said.

The rebuilding process paused during the winter months, and he said that allowed a time to restart conversations with the Hollandale search committee.

Ooms accepted a call to be the pastor in Hollandale and he preached his first Sunday in Hollandale in March. But a spring move also has challenges. While he has moved into the parsonage in Hollandale, his two youngest children, Kyle and Keli, stayed with Lynn in an apartment in Parkersburg until the end of the school year. Kyle will attend Albert Lea High School as a sophomore in the fall, and Keli graduated from Parkersburg in May.

Neal Ooms said it wasn’t as tough of a process as he expected. Lynn, Keli and Kyle drove to Hollandale about once a week, and Neal said he made the 120-mile drive to Parkersburg once a week, too.

The reverend had been in Parkersburg for more than 11 years. He began his career at a large church in a Chicago suburb and then moved to a small church in Valley Springs, S.D.

Ooms believes God led him to the Hollandale Reformed Church, and he said he’s still in the process of being acclimated to the church. To do that, he said he’s doing a lot of visiting, listening and he said he’s asking many questions.

Lynn is a registered nurse, and Neal is an emergency medical technician. He said it’s beneficial for a pastor to work on an ambulance crew in small towns, because his job keeps him in town while many other people’s jobs take them out of town. He will likely begin working with the Hollandale First Responders.

In his free time, Ooms lifts weights and does woodwork. He builds furniture like wood cabinets and chairs, which meant he filled one semi with wood and woodworking equipment when he moved to Hollandale.

“We are just excited. This is a wonderful church family here. They’ve been so warm, so welcoming,” Ooms said.