“For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” Ephesians 2:10

“My Walther experience reinforced my church activities. I always wanted to be active at church”…and that’s how Nadine Mahler Koehne ‘59 and her husband Bill ended up working at New Orleans’ Camp Restore, coordinating Lutheran-centered rebuilding and repair efforts in the Hurricane Katrina ravaged region.

Nadine and Bill planned for an active retirement of service. Nadine’s father had been active in Laborers for Christ, an organized group of dedicated Christian men and women who volunteer a portion of their retirement time to help build and repair Lutheran Church Missouri Synod congregations and schools. Nadine and Bill had their application already filled out when a Laborers for Christ recruiter phoned. Bill retired in March 2006 and the Koehnes headed off for an extended Arizona vacation. Before very long though, they and their 36 foot long RV, were headed for Frohna, Missouri and a five-month assignment to rebuild Concordia Lutheran Church.

Located in picturesque Perry County, the birthplace of the LCMS, Frohna was settled by Saxon Lutheran immigrants in the 1830s and today the town boasts a population of 197 while the average weekly attendance at Concordia is 221. The small church was built around 1874 and bore a strong resemblance to Bill’s boyhood church, Zion Lutheran Church in Bensenville, Illinois.

Nadine’s first job at Concordia was removing carpet nails. She later cut lumber and scraped old paint while Bill installed molded tin ceiling panels. Along with a crew of other retired couples, they worked days and played nights – enjoying 50 cent hamburgers at a bar and grill in nearby Altenburg!

They were honored guests and participants in a big annual Perry County parade – complete with their own homemade Laborers for Christ float -- and they sang “workers’ hymns” onstage at the Saxon Lutheran Memorial Fall Festival and enjoyed a local fall specialty, homemade apple butter, and fresh eggs from the chickens next door.

The crew worked hard and their labors payed off. The Koehne’s returned to Frohna at Christmastime for the dedication of the remodeled building. Over the course of the project they had enlarged the church vestry, added a narthex, bathrooms and a large multipurpose room – to the delight of the Concordia congregation.

Fast forward to January 2007, to the severely hurricane damaged Prince of Peace Lutheran Church and School in New Orleans East. Welcome to Camp Restore, a Christ-centered ministry of the Southern District of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod with a mission to “Restore faith, home and community to victims of Hurricane Katrina.” Laborers for Christ have refurbished the vacated church and school for use as a volunteer camp from which they bring the hope of Jesus Christ as they rebuild homes, churches and schools in New Orleans and the surrounding area.

As Nadine served in the office nerve center at Camp Restore, Bill escorted groups of volunteers from across the country to their work assignments. Many volunteers, but not all, come from LCMS churches. Bill has worked with Lutheran groups from Nebraska and South Carolina, Frankenmuth, Michigan, Buffalo and Long Island, New York and individual workers from Kansas and Connecticut, but he has also coordinated college workers from Michigan State University, young Catholics from South Dakota and a young native American who practiced the Bahai faith.

Forty-four Laborers for Christ spent January through March in New Orleans taking their turn coordinating building and recovery work, working side by side with teams who cut lawn, placed drywall, painted new construction and performed countless other necessary jobs. Throughout the affected area, scenes of devastation linger. Utility service is sporadically restored. Nineteen months after Hurricane Katrina, a walk through the lower Ninth Ward shows a disabled car wedged immobile between the crumbling walls of two homes, the roof from one destroyed house topping the frame of another, the organ from the second floor of Trinity Lutheran Church laying in pieces on the ground outside of the church and scores of homes reduced to nothing more than painted matchsticks. Workers have become accustomed to the drive-by shouts of blessing and thanks from local residents, of whom only about 20% have returned to the area. Camp Restore will continue restoration operations until they are no longer needed, possibly for the next ten years.

Camp Director and Chaplain, Pastor Ed Brashier, sees to the spiritual needs of the work crews, which include retired pastors, teachers on sabbatical, a drifter who came to know Jesus, and even other Walther alumni. Walther’s 2007 band tour concert at Camp Restore counted Nadine, Paul Rittmueller ’62 and Rev. Kurtis Schultz ’71, president of the Southern District, among those in the audience.

Nadine remembers her time at Walther fondly. She transferred into Walther as a junior. She sang in the choir, served on the yearbook staff and was a baton twirler. She worked at a local dry cleaner to help pay her $90 tuition each semester.

She remembers the Senior Banquet -- “We weren’t allowed to have a dance!” -- and hanging out at Concordia Cemetery in Forest Park where a friend’s father was the caretaker. “We’d be horsing around and they’d come tell us to hush because there was a funeral coming along.” Mr. Roland Eggerding of Walther’s Social Studies department was a favorite teacher, and she remembers parties with friends, shorthand class, and how pants were not allowed for girls, because it was “skirts only.” Mr. Fred Meyer was the principal and, yes, Coach Warren Hoger was there then too! “Everyone had ten hours of work study to do – my assignment was washing and drying towels,” recalls Nadine.

Nadine and Bill were both active in the Walther League West Suburban Zone, where they met. He was from Zion Lutheran Church and School in Bensenville, Illinois and went to Concordia Lutheran boarding school in Milwaukee, where he was thinking of pursuing the pastoral ministry. Nadine grew up at Immanuel Lutheran Church and School in Elmhurst, Illinois. They married after Bill got out of the military service. There was never any question that they would have a Lutheran marriage and raise Lutheran children. Their three sons, Bill ‘87, Bob ‘89 and Brian ‘93 are Walther alumni, as are daughter-in-laws Mia ’89 (Grotelueschen) and Karla ‘85 (Koenig). Nadine’s brother and sister, cousins, and cousins-in-law all went to Walther, and her grandson, Chris Koehne ’09, was the first third generation student to attend Walther.

“Bill and I were not trained for church work,” says Nadine. “We are so blessed that we can be Laborers for Christ and serve the Lord this way, helping with our hands.”

It won’t be long before the Koehnes lock up their condo (they sold their home so they COULD go on the road with Laborers for Christ), pack up their RV (yes, they have the movie and Bill says, “I never lost an awning THAT way!”) and head back to New Orleans and Camp Restore where they will join like-minded Lutherans and serve the Lord with gladness!