From the Archives: 2010

Written by Todd Mortensen

I moved to Boone 7 years ago with my wife, Miel, and we have three children. I work for ASU in the ACT program (Appalachian and the Community Together). This is a program that matches student volunteers with needs in the community.

Visiting and talking with non-profit organizations helps us determine what the community needs most and hopefully allows us to meet those needs through individual student volunteers, larger groups and academic classes that have a service-component.

I feel blessed and proud to live in this area with so many great people. The High Country is an incredible place to raise a family, filled with many examples of God’s splendor, rich cultural histories, and a host of people dedicated to making the community better for everyone. While I know I fall short often, I strive to be one of those people.

Connecting People, Building Community

I believe that one of my roles in God’s kingdom is to help connect people to each other and to community information. This realization played a role in a recent personal endeavor of mine known as ToddsCalendar.com.

Launched in December 2009, ToddsCalendar.com is an online Community Calendar, designed for posting events and announcements. It is a platform for the whole community to talk to each other, and it is free and available to anyone.

The idea was born out of a simple desire to put all of our community happenings (from kids’ events, to yard sales, to festivals, to business events) in one easy-to-use and searchable location. It is my desire that it will have the kingdom-building purpose of honoring God and connecting people.

Living a Life Rooted in the Gospel

Much of my journey towards this role can be traced back to the year after I graduated from college. I grew up in a family that taught me Christianity, but like a lot of people, I explored a number of other religious expressions in college. Soon after graduating, I went to Michigan and lived and worked on a 200-acre Mennonite farm and Peace Center for a year. Being exposed to this way of life for the first time was very inspiring.

So much of what I saw was rooted in the gospels. The command of Jesus to love your neighbor was obeyed in a literal way when the entire community helped a local family rebuild a barn that burned down due to an electrical spark.

Even the passage in Genesis, “by the sweat of your brow you shall eat” came alive in a very physical way as we labored for hours each day with horses, axes, wood, and in the dirt to grow our own food.

Christian Life is About Abiding in Christ

For the first time in my life I saw the gospels and the Scriptures lived out in what seemed like a radical fashion. But the longer I lived in the midst of this culture, the more I realized this was a simple, biblical approach to living. I was living with committed Christians who were trying to follow Christ in a humble way, and this greatly helped me become stronger and “own” my own faith. It transformed my thinking about my attempts to live out what I believed.....and since then I have been trying to grow (ever so slowly) in the Lord.

It has been fulfilling to discover each day that the Christian life is not about activity, but about relationship; not about performance, but about abiding in Christ.

In an attempt to live out the balance of working hard to connect people in several different ways and living simply in these beautiful mountains, I am reminded of the reassuring words of Jesus in Matthew 11: “Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.”