The Mission:

June 2014, the Carlsbad Fusion High School group traveled for 10 days to Soldotna and Anchorage Alaska. Soldotna is a town of 5000 on the Kenai Peninsula along the southern reach of Alaska. Working alongside the Alaskan Christian College, the students did a variety of labor-intensive work projects to improve both the college and local schools and non-profit agencies. The mission of the Alaska Christian College is to empower Alaska Natives through biblically-based education.

Completing the first leg of the trip, we then traveled to the 1st Covenant Church of Anchorage to put on Kids Camps over 4th of July weekend reaching out to local children in one of the older areas of the community. The statistics in Alaska are staggering - 75% of Alaskans experience domestic violence, with rape 2.5 times the national average. The violence towards children is also way above the average. The governor of Alaska says, "It really is the secret evil that is rotting us from the inside. It is something we don't talk about too much. It is done in the secrecy and privacy of homes." He said he's praying just for Alaska's rate of crimes like child sexual abuse -- which has been the highest in the nation -- to fall below the national average. He wants people to know that it's OK to talk about what's happened to them, wants them to have the courage to speak out.


Alaska 2014 Slideshow

Monday, June 2, 2014

When a door opens..

Our team sat together in a tight circle around a fire pit talking about where God might lead us.  How do we open a door?   How do we make sure we are ready to take on Kingdom building?  Then again, what is Kingdom Building? Is Kingdom Building traveling to another place ... another state, another country and as quickly as we can converting as many people as we can?  Is it infiltrating another culture to impact them "for the Lord."  That doesn't seem right.

As a team, we make plans.  We plan Vacation Bible Study, we plan crafts, we create expectations in our minds.  We picture children enthralled that we have travelled 2500 miles to see them and tell them about Jesus.  We imagine serving food at a soup kitchen.  We've been told about clearing brush and wooded areas (Alaskan wooded areas, mind you!). We picture "service projects" whatever they might be and all the while sharing Jesus.  But what if ? What if ... what if God is sending us for reasons, or a reason, only He knows?  What if 28 of us are headed to Alaska for 11 days just so one of the 28 (only known by Him) is to have a "chance" meeting with one person in Soldotna?  Or, we get there and are rerouted to another area and end up working with elders instead of kids?  Uh?  What do we do with all these crayons?

The point being is, as with life, and even more so when we are headed out to do Gods work, we make plans, but we are at His whim. It's His work, not ours.  His call, not ours.  His plan, not ours.

Being the hands and feet of Jesus doesn't mean we make plans, expectations and blueprints to follow and then get frustrated when we go off track.  Being the hands and feet mens just that - we go where He sends us, we respond when He places it before us and we act when He says go!

Sitting around the dancing fire, we talked about the rope climbing term On Belay.  When you climb, you are tethered to a person below you - a groundsman, of sorts, a stabilizer.  The terms On Belay and Belay On are used between the climber and the one holding the ropes, as the climber moves on up the rock.  When the climber says Belay On and the stabilizer says On Belay, it mean go on, I have the rope, I have your back, you are secure, I have you covered.

As we move into this mission trip, as a team, we pray that we stay open to what He has planned for us and that we remain flexible and willing to be used for His will and His desires.  We pray Belay On - knowing that God replies On Belay.  He is sending us with His plan, His will and He has the ropes.
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