Community helps restore historic church

In 1924, one of the most distinctive buildings in Jasper, the current Jasper Lutheran Church, was raised. On its top, a cross higher than any other man-made landmark in town was placed. Now, 86 years after that cross went onto the church, a new cross adorns the top of the building thanks to some donations, creative thinking involving saw blades and a pinch of treacherous ladder work.

“It’s interesting because the Catholics were on this property for 43 years. We have now also been using this property for 43 years,” said Pastor John Ekstedt, referring to the shared history of the church. He said that, in a way, the new cross is a new beginning.

Henry Beckmann, president the Lutheran congregation in Jasper and a man who helped to bring the new cross to the church, said about a year ago, the fire department told him that the old cross should come down. He had approached them asking what could be done with it and the fire department, though Deputy Fire Chief Ron Stanko, offered to help: they could take the cross down, help source out a new one and install it, all for free.

“I asked them to help and they came to the rescue,” said Beckmann. “No one else could have done it.”

Beckmann said that the Fire Department didn’t ask for any money to take down and put up the cross, but he’s planning on making a donation anyways.

Jasper resident Gilbert Wall built the cross at his home workshop (Beckmann said Wall has expressed some reservations about losing the important religious icon from his garage. He hopes it’s not a bad omen). and the timber came from Paul Cambridge at the Jasper Lumberyard.

“All good men,” said Beckmann.

The old cross, which had been enclosed in a plastic enclosure to stop its wood from rotting 15 years ago, was taken down because it was succumbing to old age. The plastic had developed some cracks, allowing moisture to leak in. The cross rotted anyways and the moisture now inside the wood froze in the winter and expanded. Pieces of plastic, some bigger than a man’s hand, broke off.

“It proved to be quite hazardous,” said Beckmann. People could have been injured, he believes.

Beckmann said getting out the old cross was not an easy exercise. The 12-foot-tall cross was cut down a year ago from its hundred foot high perch and that proved difficult, but getting out the base was the major endeavor. Like pulling a healthy tooth from an adult’s gums, it took some serious work.

The firefighters had to develop and use a reciprocating saw while perched on the trucks ladder to cut six feet into the church steeple and through giant nails that were holding the base in place. Developing that saw is part of the reason why it took a year to put the new cross in place, said Beckmann. A piece of wood bigger than Beckmann’s lower leg was taken out of the church’s steeple. Part of that piece of wood, six inches by six inches thick, inserted in 1924, has been donated to the Jasper Museum.

Installing the new cross, 12-feet-tall and several hundred pounds again, required some tricky maneuvering. Beckmann said the whole job took about two hours, which is pretty quick for such a tricky job. Fire fighters standing on the same ladder that was lowering the cross into place had to aim, secure and right the most important symbol in the Christian religion.

“It wasn’t easy, I know that much,” said Beckmann.

Pastor Ekstedt said that the cross is obviously a big part of the Lutheran Church, which he believes is a distinct icon in Jasper. He said he’s had tourists who are not even from Jasper come up to him and tell him that the Lutheran Church, with its plain brick charms, is the place where they want to be married. 

“These were people who are not even from the community but they still felt a connection,” said Ekstedt. 

Both men said they had a wide variety of people in Jasper, from the religious to the not so religious asking them ‘What happened to the cross?’

Pastor Ekstedt said that by returning the cross to its rightful place, the church has become whole again. This is fortuitous, he believes, because the new cross comes at another crossroad in the Lutheran churches history. Pastor Ekstedt is leaving the church to return to New Westminster, B.C. after serving in the area for approximately the last two years. Although he served the area earlier in his pastorship for much more than two years, he is now entering back into retirement after coming out of it to work at the Lutheran Church.

“It wouldn’t have been quite right to leave,” said Ekstedt, before the cross was back up. “It’s just the way things worked out. As you say, the Lord can sometimes work in mysterious ways.”