Joshua on 'one foot in, one foot out' of Union Church

Have you ever known a workaholic? The way this guy described it was that outside of work, "Not one person depended on me, nor I upon them." There's nothing wrong with working hard, but it can take over in an unhealthy way.

Well, there are also churchaholics, what Bob Lupton calls "unneighbors" (Restoring At-Risk Communities, 87). People who you can't interact with unless you go to the same church. Like working hard, there isn't anything wrong with being deeply involved with your church, but at some point it becomes withdrawal from society. It reminds me of students with headphones blasting, oblivious to their surroundings.

I don't really feel in danger of becoming a workaholic or churchaholic, but that's how it always is, isn't it? You look up one day and realize that all your meaningful relationships are in one place and you've neglected your neighbors: family, those who live nearby, or the most vulnerable in society. "You have to re-neighbor yourself," as Tim Keller puts it. We hope to nurture connections within Union and throughout the neighborhood.

(We are heading up a South Lake Union based group seeking to be intentional about: 1. moving into close geographical proximity to one another 2. supporting one another through daily community practices that help us follow Jesus 3. connecting ourselves and our resources to the people of South Lake Union 4. maintaining "one foot in, one foot out" of Union Church)

The First Week

"Programs are a poor substitute for what neighbors can do best."
-Bob Lupton in Restoring At-Risk Communities: Doing it Together and Doing it Right (John M. Perkins, Ed.), 86.

We are wondering what being neighbors with the people of South Lake Union will be like. In fact, we're getting a little impatient. Relationships take time, but I'd rather skip the awkward developing phase and go straight into the familiarity and confidence that comes after some roots grow.

This week in the neighborhood in a nutshell: chatted with someone planting in the pea patch, met a lady from Crossroads on the other side of the corner from our place, connected with a health care resident from the Mirabella, had tea with Tim and Cote of Dust Church, and stopped by the Cascade People's Center where we met Emily, Blair, Stephanie, and Mierta (and asked a bunch of questions). That doesn't seem like much. Hopefully future weeks that are less full of getting settled can be more full of neighborhood connecting.

There is plenty more to find out about and much to ponder as we weave our lives into the fabric of this wonderful neighborhood. We don't yet know what it will look like to maintain one foot in and one foot out of Union, because even though its focus is also South Lake Union, the people we are connected to there live all over the Seattle area.

Tim Soerens, a CRC Pastor here who leads Dust Church, says that this neighborhood is right on the edge of being "a participatory, democratic, mixed income, urban, walkable livable neighborhood, or--like a lot of other neighborhoods, it will be gentrified so quickly that it will kind of be like two ghettos together--one for the very rich, and one for the very poor." This reality grabs me and gets me excited about being the kind of neighbor that gets people together. May the seeds of these relationships be planted in the coming weeks.