A missionary’s vision for seeing nativeAlaskans take their land for Christ
By Jami Becher
They make their way through the wilderness seeking refuge from the dark and the cold. Finally it comes into view. On a snow covered slope sits a house, comfortable and warm. Light spills from the windows. The smell of home cooking hangs on the frosty air. This house is special; it was purchased with these special people in mind. It was furnished so they would be comfortable. It was prayed over that the darkness might be dispelled for all who gather there. It’s Friday night at the home of North American Mission Board collegiate missionary Brenda Crim and the students have just arrived.
“My house is always full of life, especially when the students are here,” Brenda says. “Otherwise, it’s just me, but I made sure I bought a home big enough to share with guests.” On Friday nights Brenda hosts a discipleship dinner for students from the University of Alaska, Anchorage. “I prepare a home-cooked meal, get the students off campus, and give them a place to be. I try to give them some options for good clean fun.”
Many of the students who are a part of Baptist Collegiate Ministry at UAA are native Alaskans. Most of them came to BCM as a result of a friendship that developed between Brenda and Melissa Okitkun, a Y’upik Eskimo student from the small village of Kotlik.
Engaging in relationships
Brenda met Melissa through a Sonic Flood concert she was promoting on campus. They made an instant connection through their mutual affinity for athletics and slowly began to forge a friendship. “I was trying to pace this relationship and give it time for trust to develop,” Brenda says. “I’ve learned that if students share sensitive information too quickly, they may regret it and disappear from my life.”
Slowly the friendship forged, and a mentoring relationship emerged. Native students are taught to glean wisdom from elders, and Melissa was absorbing all as if Brenda were a village elder. “She began to share with me the mental battles she was waging,” Brenda says. “And I would use that time to teach her how to fight those battles with the Truth. In time she gave her life to the Lord.”
Networking for evangelism
Melissa is a great influencer of her peers. She’s someone they trust and respect. Mel O, as she is known, has great talent and vision as a leader yet she remains the life of the party. Brenda recognized her potential in helping bring other Native students to Christ. “Several Native students began coming with Melissa to our Breakaway student worship on campus,” Brenda says. “They began to build bridges of trust with me and I was elated. Then Melissa began inviting them to my house on Fridays. I knew I was in when they started staying late into the night.”
Friday nights at Brenda’s provide an inviting place for the students to share their lives. Many of them, like Melissa, are from isolated villages where they’ve experienced tragedies and loss that young people should never have to deal with. On occasion, these issues emerge in talking circles in Brenda’s den, unveiling sources of internal struggles or pain that students bring with them to school.
“Students sometimes share from the depths of their hearts,” Brenda says. “They talk about heart-wrenching issues of loss. Tragic deaths often occur—avalanches, hypothermia, snow mobile accidents, boating accidents, and fires. In remote areas, villagers have to pull together to render aid to each other. When you dial 911, no one answers.
“Add to that our social issues,” Brenda continues. “Alaska leads the nation in child abuse, suicide, rape, incest, teen pregnancy, STDs, and alcoholism. An alarming percentage of our students have lost their innocence as children. Despair replaces any hope for change. When bad news comes from home of a loss or a tragedy, they endure the news far away from the support of the village—airfare to their homes is $500-$800.”
That’s where talking circles (small groups where everyone gets a say) help in airing their concerns.
Sowing the gospel
One Saturday around 1 a.m. after a talking circle, Brenda had a divinely inspired thought. “I said, ‘Wouldn’t it be awesome if we could go into a village and have a lock-in where you could serve as peer mentors?’” she says. “An indigenous movement of God, that’s what must happen in villages—Natives reaching Natives. I want us, together, to take our land back for Christ.” The students suggested targeting Kotlik, Mel’s home.
That’s when the hard work began. Putting together a lock-in with music, pizza, and all the trimmings in a remote Alaskan village wouldn’t be easy. Kotlik is on the west coast of Alaska where the Yukon River meets the Bering Sea. “It’s two plane rides from the nearest Wal-Mart,” Brenda says. “Truly, the uttermost end of the U.S. It’s hard and expensive to get there from Anchorage, costing about $780 per person.” But God began opening doors that would allow Brenda, and UAA students—Melissa, Leon (Mel’s brother), Jessica MacArthur, and Drew Shannon—to make the six-hour, 500-mile plane trip to bring the Good News to high school students in Kotlik.
It was a divine appointment: the Christian Pilots Association of Alaska agreed to fly the team to Kotlik for just the cost of fuel. A contribution from a close friend of Brenda’s enabled her to pay the $2,200 fuel cost, plus shipping pizza, breakfast foods, and fresh fruit to serve at the lock-in, an unusual treat for villagers whose common fare is what’s in season, whether it’s salmon, moose, caribou, geese, or seal. “The principal of the school has a heart for the students, and was happy to accommodate our event in the Kotlik school,” Brenda says.
God changed Melissa’s heart and now He was giving her the opportunity to have a hand in changing the hearts of others. “I think differently now,” she says. “I care more about people than I did before. I choose to be a better role model because a lot of the students back home—most of them are my cousins—look up to me. They say they want to be like Mel, go to college and become something too.”
Melissa poured her heart and soul into preparing for the lock-in and when it all came together over a fourth of the school’s students were there, listening to what she had to say. Melissa came up with the theme from a hip-hop song titled “Walk it Out.” The idea was to help students learn that it’s possible to overcome life’s difficulties through a powerful walk with Christ. Brenda and Jimmy Okitkun, Melissa’s father, were speakers, while Melissa shared her testimony during large group time. Then the students broke out into small groups for Bible studies, written by Mel, Leon, and Jessica on how to become a T.H.U.G (Truly Holy Unto God).
“We led a prayer of salvation at the end,” Brenda says. “And every student stepped forward. It was an amazing event for me to see the power of one student’s changed life draw other students to Christ.”
Visit www.NAMB.net to view the Monthly Missionary Focus video on Brenda Crim and Melissa Okitkun and about Brenda’s outreach ministry during the Alaskan Iditarod.
Jami Becher is editorial assistant at On Mission.