The Second Lesson for Sunday, March 8, is 1 Corinthians 1:18-15 (Third Sunday in Lent).
The message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. (vs. 18)
Remember my sermon last month about James Robertson in Detroit who walked 21 miles to work every day, until he was helped out by a college student named Evan Leedy raising money to buy him a car? In the sermon I asked if Gloria Dei might be the kind of place where people could follow Evan Leedy’s example to help those in need. Sometimes things repeat themselves.
In the Des Moines Register yesterday (March 1) there was an article by Kyle Munson about a 61 year old man in Davis City, IA who walks 35 miles every day to work as a custodian at Lakeside Casino in Osceola. I have seen that facility many times driving back and forth to Kansas on I-35. Steven Simoff takes off at 3:30 p.m. to get to his work at 11:00, leaving behind his sickly wife, Renee, who waits for him to return home the next morning around 9:00. He walks along the interstate, rather than the remote local highways, hoping that drivers will sometimes give him a ride, even though he refuses to hitchhike openly. Immediately after reading that article, I emailed Kyle Munson to see if anyone was raising money to help the Simoffs. Mr. Munson couldn’t say, but he would be happy to know if somebody did.
Maybe there is something we can do at Gloria Dei to help people like Robertson and Simoff, or maybe not. But, they aren’t going to go away any more than the gospel proclamation that we share. As Paul says above, the message about the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. Articles and stories about the Robertsons and Simoffs of the world are foolish enough to those who think that the poor cannot be saved one person at a time, but to James Robertson right now it is the power of God. What might it be for Steven and Renee?
Pastor Rob