Risky Church Business

I've had opportunities to describe the church we want to start up here in Juneau. Most everyone, especially churched people respond with blank expressions. I don't necessarily blame them.

Alaskans take great pride in their freedoms. Alaskans seem to be Alaskan first, and US citizens second. Alaskans revel in their independence, their ability to do things themselves, their relative autonomy. Starting a church on the foundation of gospel community is foreign to many. Church attendance comes with little personal risk. But covenant gospel community where lives are shared is very risky.

The writer Jean Vanier said, "Community is where our limitations and our egoism are revealed to us." On a similar theme Mark Sayers has written,  "Humans need covenant. Without it we drown in our freedoms." Covenant gospel community is the antithesis of 'commodification' where we each treat people as commodities, using them for our own felt needs instead of valuing committed relationships and the associated responsibility toward others as the classroom in which God molds our character. Covenant gospel community is like marriage; both are arenas where we are shaped and disciplined, where we learn to lay down our own agendas. All of this is risky.

I dream of and am working toward a church that emphasizes community over individualism; mission over complacency; covenant over consumerism; multiplication over stasis; Jesus over self. The Church must be both a present reality and a preview of coming attractions. The intentional witness and observable worship of the church must inhabit the places between heaven and earth, a taste of  what it will be like when heaven and earth are reunited by God, with creation rallied around the God of the gospel.

All of this is risky as I call myself and others to risk losing much to gain so much more.

High Season

It's the high season. The locals are happy. The school kids are almost done with school. People are wearing shorts, seeing their own bare knees for the first time in months. Kayak and canoe racks have replaced ski racks on car tops. Most of our elected State officials have left town to drink their own morning coffee and sleep, finally, in their own beds at home.

Our already low unemployment numbers have plummeted. Our little town is full of tourists. Local businesses are punching out sales receipts as buyers walk away with more tee shirts, more ball caps, more guide books and more photos with the fake life size Sarah Palin than anyone can possibly use. I'm becoming a fan of the University of Nebraska sweatshirt combined with the hat from Ketchikan as seen on numerous globe-trotting retirees. I also like hearing the word "ulu" used in sentences. ("Look Ma! While you were busy buying glacial silt soap I went to the Ulu Shop and bought the kids an ulu!")

The cruise ships hang around town for about ten hours or so, and their bipedal cargo step out ready to cram as much Southeast Alaska excitement in those few hours as possible. Shiny new tour buses and decrepit old tour buses shuttle people from their nautical chariots to see whales, glaciers and bears, sample the local beer and gorge on cedar planked salmon like emaciated harbor seals.

The buses are everywhere. It might be impossible to make a left turn from an intersection. I am learning new alternative routes to get anywhere and everywhere. But, I am liking all this. Our town is happy.

Meanwhile I have a church to work on, since we don't yet have a church to work in. The seasonal rhythms of our city, including the high season will impact this work. As to how remains to be seen.

The Pharisee Within Me

I was reminded yet again yesterday of some not so savory things respective to me.

I attended a workshop event related to ending domestic violence. I sensed the other participants made assumptions about my theology solely on the basis of my attendance. I heard differing views on who God is and what it will take for society to be transformed. At times I felt I somehow needed to defend God against relativism, though God doesn't need me or anyone to defend Him. He is His own defense. But I left feeling defensive for God.

Earlier in the week I saw our young neighbor stuff the dumpster with more refuse than the dumpster's capacity could bear. Ironically, a bear had proven this true be strewing said trash all over the parking area on Monday night . I was indignant as I swept up the mess Tuesday afternoon. Soon after I was convicted; I had not made enough effort to know our neighbor, a struggling single Mom. I was too consumed with my own comfort to recognize her need for unrequited friendship and support.

I am learning that intentional gospel missionality requires I dispose of my biases and the judgmental spirit I attempt to disavow but possess none the less. For if I am honest, the character/s I most identify with in the Bible are not the heroes of the faith, but the Pharisees who loved their religion more than people.

I spent Tuesday evening repenting of my Pharisaic attitude, and Wednesday morning preaching the gospel to myself. Jesus has not called me to plant a church filled with Pharisees led by a Pharisee. He has called me to plant a church filled with forgiven sinners led by a forgiven sinner following a forgiving Lord.

Big City Small Town

I spent Friday and Saturday with the Crimson Bears in Haines, Alaska. We went to the home of the Glacier Bears. (Picture a real life animal with silver fur and blue eyes. Based on the taxidermist's work mounted in a glass case I guess they really do exist.)

Haines is small town America, with Alaskan weather. Picture in your mind Half Moon Bay, or La Conner, or Carpinteria in the old days. Haines boasts the highest concentration of bald eagles in North America. Everybody (people, not necessarily eagles) knows everybody. It was Prom weekend, and it seemed the entire town was mobilized to provide a quality experience for the seniors and their dates. Haines is apparently well known throughout the region for their creative prom themes.

And I heard it said more than once, "Oh, you're from Juneau; the big city." Now according to me and my continental ways Juneau is a lot of things, but big she is not. But to folks living in Sitka, Ketchikan, Wrangell, Petersburg, Skagway or Haines, Juneau is the big city, with big city lights and big city energy. Juneau is where one goes for shopping, and for intensive medical care. Juneau is where one goes for a university education, and for employment. The other towns have cars; we have "traffic."

Juneau is not big, but Juneau is vitally strategic. Most if not all of the culture of Southeast Alaska passes through the filter that is Juneau. The other Southeast towns are dependent on Juneau. Maybe by choice; maybe not.

In starting up a new church in Juneau we cannot be limited in vision or scope to Juneau alone. We need to see what happens in Juneau as being vital and strategic to what could happen in other places in Southeast. We need to raise up leaders who will go and grow the church in other Southeast places, connected by vision and heart if not necessarily by timely travel.

If you want to see what a new church start up can look like, both the highs and lows, come our way. But if you want to see an impressive high school prom, go to Haines.

Juneau by Land, and Sea, and Air

Juneau is a beautiful city. In relation to some other Alaskan cities Juneau is considered a clean city...probably because the rain washes the grime away. Often.

Deb and I live five miles from anywhere we want to go in town. Juneau is like living on an island. You can't drive away from here. The roads just stop. Bad news for car thieves I suppose.

Juneau is also a city that knows transition. While once the Territorial Capital, Juneau became the Alaskan State Capital. This past week the State senators and representatives dropped the gavel for the final time on this year's legislative session, and quickly left town. By air, I presume. As mentioned, they can't drive away from here. And the commercial fishing fleet is now fully occupied on the local and distant waters. The people around town wearing the "Deadliest Catch" tee shirts are not the professionals.

This week, today in fact, Juneau transitions into tourist season. Over the course of the next five months over one million people will disembark from giant cruise ships to come ashore and buy things. Every shop in town is now open and eagerly ready for business. The Alaskan Brewery is responding with an innumerable count of new logo wear options.

It is a challenge for me to think through how to establish a new church in Juneau when our city is so transient. The rhythms of Juneau are pronounced and dramatic, and so very seasonal. We cannot have any tangible gospel impact in our city and culture unless we build that church on the basis of "missional communities," people willing to covenant together on mission to our transitory city. Missional communities, among other things will provide a family, a place to belong, a church, a home away from home even for those who do not reside in Juneau year round.

We'll have to get very used to, and even embrace the idea of serving and sharing our one hope in Jesus with people always in transition, as the seasons change.