Today’s blog post has been commissioned by the Riverside Innovation Hub to bring in the stories and views from our partner congregations forward. We first start off with a piece by Kaylie Johnson, a member of the Trinity Lutheran congregation.
I didn’t fully understand what it meant to have a “church without walls” until I started to attend Trinity Lutheran Congregation. Part of this phrase “church without walls” is literal; we worship on Augsburg’s campus, and the offices are down the street on Riverside Avenue. The part that kept me intrigued and engaged in Trinity is the figurative meaning of a “church without walls”: A church that works outside of the church walls and seeks to be a helping and hopeful presence in the community, not only there for its congregants, but there for those who are not at Trinity on Sunday mornings. Trinity saw needs in the neighborhood, and encouraged its members to find ways to engage with the community. The Riverside Innovation Hub gave me a chance to take a leadership role in helping Trinity continue to explore what it means to be a church without walls.
Many young adults want to be active in the community, and want to serve the neighbor in whatever capacity is needed. We want to feel connected to those around us, and we want to fight for equality, justice, and healing for those around us. We yearn to hear our neighbors’ stories, and we want to provide space for them to be heard. Unfortunately, we don’t always feel heard. I was immediately drawn into the project, to have the ability to create a young adult-led team, seeking to serve our neighbors.
I have both lived in the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood and now work in the neighborhood, and knew that there were many opportunities for faith communities to leave the church walls and be there for the neighbor. Having the chance to lead the church in this project, as a young adult, was humbling and invigorating. At times, we found ourselves at an impasse, unsure of what we could do next with our project. Thankfully, when we found ourselves in these situations, we had the support of the congregation behind us, ready to assist in whichever ways they could. Like many others around us, we experienced difficulties being present in the neighborhood at the height of COVID-19, but have begun to find our way back, and never lost our congregation’s interest or support.
We are hoping that our project will continue to intrigue and engage young adults for years to come, and hope to create a sustainable solution to help young adults stay engaged in church and community. We find God in the world in our interactions with others, and in the connections that we made and will continue to make. We get to know and serve our neighbor by standing on the street in Cedar-Riverside on a Friday night, serving pizza and Somali tea, providing a safe space with community members who have been invested in this for years. As one of our young adults leaders said on a Friday night, on the corner of Cedar and Riverside, “this is God’s work.”