Nebraska Synod ELCA

The Cass County Fair smells like frying hamburgers and fresh coffee by midmorning. By afternoon, the air is thick with dust, laughter, and the sound of 4‑H kids leading animals toward the show ring. In the middle of the fairgrounds stands a small white building with hand‑painted picnic tables that reads “North Branch.” It looks like any other fair food stand. For First Lutheran Church (North Branch) of Avoca, it has become something more.

From Methodist Vision to Lutheran Calling

The stand itself has a history rooted in another congregation. In 1975, when there was little else on that part of the grounds, members of the Methodist church in nearby Weeping Water decided their church needed to be where the community gathered. The fair was the community. So they built a stand and began serving up burgers, hot dogs, and, most famously, homemade pie.

“Everyone came for the pies,” remembers Dave Spohr, a lifelong member of that Methodist congregation. “People would drive in from Omaha and Lincoln and even Iowa. The ladies back then committed to making homemade pies, and it just became what you did at the fair.” He grew up in that stand, learning not only how to cook and serve, but how to share stories of how the church helped people. “People learn scripture in all different ways,” he says. “When you are hands‑on, seeing what you are doing, touching, eating with people, hearing how the church has helped, you just become a better person.”

Over the decades, though, Dave’s congregation aged. At one point, he estimated that 90 percent of the members were over 80. The physical work of planning, cooking, and serving for a full fair week became too much. Dave could see that the stand was still important to the fair and to the wider community, but his own church no longer had the people to keep it going.

So he approached First Lutheran in Avoca, known locally as North Branch.

“Dave came and said his church was getting smaller and they did not want to handle it anymore,” remembers Dennis Knake, who was council president at First Lutheran at the time. “He asked if we would be interested in taking over the food stand.”

Dennis took the idea to the congregation with more than a little trepidation. He had grown up showing horses at the Cass County Fair and knew what the week demanded. Volunteers would have to plan menus, buy and prepare food, organize shifts, clean, restock, and manage money. It sounded like a lot of work. The council discussed it. The congregation discussed it. Some were hesitant. What did a fair food stand have to do with ministry?

In the end, more than a hundred members voted, unanimously, to say yes. They did so with one clear condition. Every dollar of profit, beyond the cost of running and maintaining the stand, would be given away outside the congregation.

“The money was never going to be for building improvements or our own needs,” says Pastor Adam Klinker. “We could use it for that, but no one wanted to. We decided from the beginning that this would be about blessing our neighbors.”

Shared Blessings: When Fair Week Becomes a Lifeline

They created what they now call the Shared Blessings Fund. Over the past four years, the stand has generated thousands of dollars a year in profit. From that, the congregation has given away roughly twenty thousand dollars to people in Cass County, Otoe County, and the surrounding area.

“Usually we give a gift of a thousand dollars,” Pr. Adam explains. “If there is a house fire or storm damage, a tragic death, a farm accident, or a family that is really behind on utilities, we show up on their doorstep and hand them a check. No questions asked. We tell them we are praying for them.”

The money matters. It pays for hotel rooms after a fire, groceries when a breadwinner is hurt, electricity when a job loss leaves a family short. Yet for First Lutheran, the deeper ministry of the fair stand is not just financial.

“It is ministry in two ways,” Pr. Adam says. “Yes, it gets our name out into the community. People see ‘North Branch’ on the sign and know who we are. But even more, it is the camaraderie and the personal interaction between the people working in the stand.”

Supper Rush Discipleship

During Cass County Fair week, the stand runs from Tuesday through Saturday. The schedule is jam-packed, and volunteers sign up for four‑hour shifts. Many people sign up for two or three, not only because it’s necessary but because they love and cherish the work and community.. Some work the grill; others take orders at the windows, run food, or staff the pie counter. They serve breakfast, burgers, hot dogs, walking tacos, taco salads, and sloppy joes. The taco and sloppy joe meat is made by members. Brownies are baked at home and brought in. Pies are still homemade, baked in church kitchens and carried to the stand in carefully labeled tins.

Children lean on the counter, learning how to greet customers, count back change, and smile. Amanda Stubbendick, who serves in youth ministry, laughs when she talks about the youngest volunteers. “Our youngest is three,” she says. “She stands with her head in the window talking to people.”

The week is busy and sometimes chaotic. Supper rushes test the limits of patience and endurance. While the orders stack up, volunteers flip burgers, make and refill coffees, and connect with community members.

In that chaos, something beautiful happens. “If you have lived through a supper rush together, then you can do about anything together,” Amanda says.

Connections form in ways they never would during coffee hour in the church basement. One night during a lull, a single man from the congregation mentioned that some evenings he just eats sauerkraut for supper. Amanda immediately invited him to the church’s meal‑prep ministry, which had mostly been attended by women.

“Now he comes every time,” she says. “That connection would not have happened without us standing side by side in this little kitchen.”

The stand is fully intergenerational. There are elders who have been in the congregation for decades, teenagers in their first jobs, small children eager to help, and adults in every stage of life. The work is shared, and stories are, too.

“There is something powerful about little kids working alongside adults and older people,” Dennis says. “You see people in a different way.”

Dave has seen that power from the perspective of the previous owners. One of his favorite stories involves an older woman from his congregation who baked pies every year.

“Sometimes as Christians we forget about the needs of an older person and how they still want to feel needed and wanted,” he says. “The pies brought the women back in. People would ask, ‘Who made this pie?’ and then there was this friendly competition over whose pie was best and who would try to outdo it next year. It made them an important part of something big.”

That same woman later left roughly half of her estate to her church.

“She was so blessed by what we did,” Dave says. “And it all started with how we treated her and her pies one week a year.”

“You Give Them Something to Eat”

For First Lutheran, the fair stand has become something like an annual living parable. Every year, the Sunday before the Cass County Fair, the lectionary reading has coincidentally been the story of Jesus feeding the five thousand.

“It has never failed,” Pr. Adam says. “The text is always Jesus saying to the disciples, ‘You give them something to eat.’ We preach it on Sunday, and then we come out here and do it all week.”

Around the stand, they have posted small scripture verses. One reminds them of that command, while another speaks to God’s abundance. In the tangible work of grilling burgers, handing out walking tacos, and sliding slices of pie across the counter, they see the body of Christ in action.

“This is the body of Christ literally in motion,” Pr. Adam says. “We are feeding God’s people in the here and now. And what we make in the process will be used to feed, clothe, and house people in the months ahead.”

For some, the idea of buying and running a fair food stand might still sound like an odd choice for a church. It is not a program anyone would find in a standard list of ministry ideas. Yet for First Lutheran, it has become a natural outgrowth of who they are.

“Our congregation did not shoot Dennis down when he brought the idea,” Amanda reflects. “We prayerfully and thoughtfully considered it. Even the people who voted no at the time have come and worked and said, ‘This is not so bad.’”

It is exhausting work. By the end of the week, everyone is tired. Then the fair ends, the stand closes, and the congregation begins to plan for next year.

In that rhythm of yearly preparation, intense service, and generous giving, First Lutheran in Avoca has discovered a ministry that looks like frying pans, pie plates, and long hours of grilling. It sounds like teenagers calling out orders and a three‑year‑old chatting with customers in the window. It tastes like homemade chocolate, cherry, and pecan pie.

Most of all, it feels like the church living out a simple call, repeated on a dusty fairground every August. You give them something to eat.