10/08/2014

Trinity's Midweek Blast for October 8, 2014

Making All Things New in Theological Education

Joy, life, and hope to you in the name of the living Christ!

In response to the critical need we face in the formation of leaders, and aware of the financial stress of our seminaries, former Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson in 2013 formed the Theological Education Advisory Council (TEAC). In a proposal made last year commending the work of TEAC, the ELCA's Kenneth Inskeep and Jonathan Strandjord wrote these words:

The ELCA needs new kinds of leaders. It needs a diverse group of leaders to meet the challenge of a rapidly changing, diverse, and complex society. It needs a broad range of leaders capable of inspiring the church and leading local communities of faith in "always becoming new." The ELCA needs leaders with diverse skills appropriated in diverse ways. We need to know more about what keeps this from happening to the degree necessary and more about how to make it happen.

The members of TEAC came together last October for their first gathering. This advisory council was commissioned with a two-year timeline so as to make recommendations to the ELCA's Church Council in the fall of 2015. Last week at the Lutheran Center in Chicago, conversation took place among certain church leaders - seminary presidents and academic deans, seminary board chairs, bishops, Churchwide staff, and members of the Theological Education Advisory Council (TEAC). With one year into the work of TEAC, we gathered to receive and respond to a preliminary report that emerged out of TEAC's widespread engagement with constituencies within the church. The report states:

The Church Council specifically authorized TEAC to convene seminary leaders (presidents, board chairs, and synod bishops serving on seminary boards) to share counsel on strategic plans, present and possible new collaborations, degree program innovations, and what all this means for our patterns of identifying and preparing leaders. In short, the ELCA Church Council called for attention to the ELCA's theological network in its full breadth and in all its connections with the life and work of the ELCA while at the same time calling for focused engagement with and attention to our seminaries.

The preliminary report said that the ELCA needs a theological education network that is:

• More far-reaching;
• More connected and flexible; and,
• More sustainable.

It is telling that on the day before these conversations took place last week, people gathered for the fall assignment process. Collectively, the system had only enough candidates to fill 36% of the need for first-call pastors. Last spring the number was 58%.

Last Sunday, I was invited to preach at St. Mark's Lutheran Church in Van Wert, Ohio. Founded in 1864, St. Mark's is celebrating 150 years as a congregation. It is a congregation that has been in mission for so long that when you ask, "Will the charter members please stand?" no one does! I also had the opportunity to hold a forum on Trinity Lutheran Seminary. Pastor Will Haggis (Trinity Class of '87) has been ably serving there as their pastor for nine years. They are blessed by his leadership. But when the time comes when God may call Pastor Haggis to another setting or even into retirement, from where will they get their next pastor? Every congregation should be asking this question. Every congregation should be active in nurturing and identifying those who have the gifts for vocational service in the church. With massive retirements scheduled over the coming years, not only is the gap widening between available candidates and congregations needing candidates, we also face the need for new kinds of leaders.

While in these discussions in Chicago, we were asked to name BIG IDEAS and BIG CONCERNS. These will be the subject of my blast next week. In the meantime, it is important for us to remember the message of the Gospel. God emptied the tomb that held our Lord Jesus Christ and raised him up to new life for the sake of the world. God does God's best work when the stakes are highest and the challenges the steepest. The story of the church from our scriptures is a story that speaks of a church facing all kinds of challenges and yet a church which, by the grace of God and with faithful and courageous leaders, managed to change, thrive and serve. That can be us.

In the abiding hope of the empty tomb,


Rick Barger, '89
President
Trinity Lutheran Seminary