Members of St. Mark Evangelical Lutheran Church, Bloomfield, Neb., gather around Monika Ruff (to the left of Timothy Koester, pastor, and in inset) for a final blessing before she leaves for Germany.
KEVIN MILLIKAN Meet Monika
A ‘stranger in our midst’ transforms Nebraska congregation By Robert Elliott
O
n a June morning in 2011, Timothy Koester, pastor of St. Mark Evangelical Lutheran Church in Bloomfield, Neb., got a phone call from a nearby motel. The motel owner hoped Koester could help him resolve a problem. So the pastor agreed to walk to the motel to see what he could do. When he arrived, Koester
learned that a 63-year-old German woman was stranded at the motel. An agency had paid for a couple of nights stay, but the money had run out. Now the woman was stuck with no resources, serious health prob- lems and nowhere to go. “I went to meet her and thereby began an epic journey with one of the most interesting people I’ve ever met, Monika Ruff,” Koester said. Ruff and her mother had set out
to see all of the U.S., but her mother developed Alzheimer’s disease and died. Ruff became sick and was hos-
36 The Lutheran •
www.thelutheran.org
pitalized in South Dakota. Then her RV caught fire and was towed to a junkyard a few miles from the motel in Nebraska. To complicate mat- ters, her visa had expired. Ruff was undocumented. Koester called some of St. Mark’s members, and they raised enough money to house her at the motel a few more nights. Then for almost two years,
Ruff became an integral part of the life and ministry of St. Mark. The congregation bought a small one- bedroom home in Bloomfield and named it the House of Hope. Ruff and her four cats moved in that fall. Ruff attended worship every Sun- day and was frequently at the church during the week. She translated the congregation’s early history and records from German to English. But her health continued to be a
problem. She was diabetic. At times back problems made her barely able
to walk, and she had to be driven everywhere. Her immigration status made it hard for her to get treatment and services. Ruff eventually reconnected with
a distant cousin in Germany, who suggested she move back to Ger- many to receive free health care. Koester contacted the German
consulate in Chicago on Ruff’s behalf last fall. Over the next few months, they resolved her Ameri- can immigration status and she was issued travel papers for her return. In April, Koester and another
member, Jim Tighe, drove Ruff and her four cats to Chicago and put them on a plane to Germany. She left behind a gift for St. Mark—her fam- ily’s Luther Bible printed in German and published in 1734. Koester said the people of St. Mark are still in the process of divin- ing what their experience with Ruff means for their ministry. “We [believe] God put Monika among us to show us a whole new way to minister to the strangers in our midst,” he said. “What can we do for others who are falling through the cracks and don’t get attention because they don’t know how to ask or we just don’t see them? “Whatever God has in store for us, things around here will never be the same. Monika opened our eyes and opened us up.”
Elliott is a freelance writer and a member of Lutheran Church of the Holy Spirit in Chicago.
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