LCMS Convention - Maintaining Unity and Navigating Challenges with Pastor John Karolus

It will be the first time that he's been representing the Lutheran Church of Missouri Synod at our convention as a pastoral delegate and I just wanted to hear his heart and some of his highlights , john , that you're looking forward to experiencing .

And then , as you're looking at some of the resolutions right now , namely floor committee six and floor committee seven , resolution six and seven around pastoral formation and Concordia University system . Just hear your heart on that . So , john , welcome to this bonus episode of Lead Time man .

You know , it's always exciting to see those resolutions or partnering with new church bodies and getting to read those , those conversations and interactions , that , whether it be President Harrison or CTCR representative or somebody who was able to communicate the message , like , hey , you know what , we got your request , we've talked through it , we're excited to be

partnering with you in the gospel , and so you know , we've got this beautiful , beautiful , traditional picture hopefully leads us to , you know , local inspiration , to really be seeking those same kinds of conversations on a personal level , on a contextual , community level of you know , hey , we've got this beautiful truth and it can , it can really impact and change

your life in an incredible way . And you know , it's kind of like the conversation of come on , come on into our new member meeting , come on into our worship space , let's bring you to the waters of baptism . It's a , it's an awesome thing .

So not only in the United States but across the globe , we have a whole host of word and sacrament partners , alter and pulpit partners , and I think that is something to certainly celebrate . The family is big and we want to get even bigger . So let's talk some of the areas of concern that you may have .

Let me give a positive one to anytime the church speaks with one voice around our clarity , around scripture and the truth of who God is and how he reveals himself to us . You can talk first , second , third article , realities .

I pray that more of those postures are seen as holding up scripture , holding up the word of Jesus , the never-changing word of God , and then the way we talk about cultural issues . Hopefully it has a fair amount of humility and truth at the very same time .

And I think some of the cultural concerns today , maybe the splintering of the family right , you just recently got married , congratulations .

But anytime the church can speak to those kind of core values , of what it means to be human , male , female while at the same time saying , hey , there's a number of different people with different perspectives and we're here to welcome them in .

You belong here within this church , and then we're all going to come under the cross of Christ in confession , needing his grace . So yeah , there's a whole host of , I think , topics as it relates to culture that will be neat to see the church have a unified , balanced , truth and love kind of position on as well . Anything to add there , john ?

It's such a treasure to be able to do that without fear of compromising our message , without fear of being corrupted in some way , just because we're able to take people wherever they're at , because we recognize that corruption and brokenness go so deep into us that none of us is free of something that would disqualify us from relationship with God .

And I think that that freedom of conversation gives us the opportunity to build bridges in places where popular Christian movements or other kinds of religious backgrounds or even political movements .

You know , it's like there's certain areas you can't cross into and yet I think the way that our confessions are written and just obviously the way the scriptures have been inspired and revealed to us through the work of Jesus , crossing those borderlines is such a strength of ours and , I think , an opportunity we have to continue to grow in our representation of him

, our , our , our ambassador ring for Jesus .

Agreeably , with one of the maybe metaphors that we have been kind of wrestling with with the ULC is anytime on our confession mission-minded spectrum , which , by the way , goes back a long time , like we have been having these debates throughout the entirety office , fully ministry or office of public ministry , and the priest of all believers , like this goes back almost

200 years , now 175 years . So anytime you're that close , let's use music as an example .

Right A , two , two notes that are so close but yet so far not in harmony , it creates the most dissonant sound , and so we should have ample love and charity for one another who have different perspectives , but yet the tone may be super , super dissonant within the family . Anything to add to that , john ?

And so when we share some of those experimental or exploratory steps that we've taken and we kind of get a response that would challenge that , it's hard for us to continue in that conversation in a Christian , in a loving , in a sibling-like way , and sadly I think that gets exaggerated , that gets emphasized the bigger the setting and the audience tends to get .

And so when we get to the level where a national church body now offering opinions that seem to be representative of districts , of factions , of groups , of regions , it's hard to maintain that Christian unity and that open line of communication .

And so definitely a huge challenge for us , but one I think that I was able to attend the 2019 convention as kind of a district liaison during my Vicarage year and watch the committees and write some reports and do some interviews and , yeah , that's the opportunity is well , we have a chance to talk to each other and the challenge is can we do it in a

constructive way ?

John ?

Can we give guys opportunities to continue improving their preaching , learning how to listen better , learning how to minister better ? One of the programs and I totally agree with all of that I mean those are goals I hope every pastor has to continue to improve and get better and stronger in those areas .

One of the resources that we have as young pastors as , I should say , recent graduates from the seminaries

is the ability to , or maybe , if we're new to a district , a chance to engage in a program that allows us to build a peer group that's finding itself in a similar situation and a lot of the Synod uses the acronym TALS Pals .

That's one , and out on the West Coast we're in coordination with a couple other districts for map ministry-applied practice and a worry I have is that if we mandate one particular method for providing those resources and peer group support , we're gonna miss out on the contextual specificity needed to be an effective communicator of the gospel in particular contexts , and

so that's one where I would certainly try to offer the opinion , maybe on the floor , committee day , maybe on the day of the vote itself , just to say , hey , I don't know that we need to be so restrictive .

We certainly can be encouraging this kind of thing , but also , let's trust each other to do this kind of thing in a constructive way that's tailored to the different places we're all serving , because even in our district , I'm talking with guys that are in vastly different situations than I am , and yet we're able to lean on each other and listen to each other and

provide support .

Obviously he would speak mostly to the character of the church , but then trusted Timothy in particular to find other people in his respective context to do Word and Sacrament ministry who had the ability to teach , etc . And to find others that had the ability to teach .

One of my concerns is that a lot of the district resolutions that were on exploring more ways to raise up leaders they were outhandedly disregarded , with very little explanation , and the resolutions that had been put together by the Pastoral Formation Committee , which consists of both seminary presidents , kevin Robeson , chief Executive Officer , reports to President Harrison ,

and then on Pastor Robeson's team is also James Bannock . That's the four people that make up the Pastoral Formation Committee and I know some of them better than others , but I can tell you there wasn't like an intentional effort to reach out to me or other people like me to get our opinion regarding those respective resolutions .

I mean , how much more valuable perspective could you get than a senior pastor at a church who just got an associate graduate , or a DP who's taken a lot of soul pastors out of seminary , or the guys that are dealing with pastors recently formed right or constantly , or even vicar supervisors you know what about a vicar supervisor from each of the seminaries ?

You know that's receiving that's . You know we've got longstanding programs .

We've got well-established guys out there who maybe don't hold a PhD or don't hold a DM in and yet could offer such great perspective on the kinds of pastors we need , the kinds of pastors that were that were , that are effective , the skills that pastors aren't coming in with , that they need .

And so you know , I guess I share in kind of maybe the disappointment in how it came out , but , as you probably also aren't surprised , you know you look at who's on the team and you look at kind of also what .

Yeah this maybe is going too far right , but if I'm a president of a seminary and I love the seminary I went to , I'm gonna automatically be thinking of what's the best thing I can do for my seminary , and it's a treasure . We really need to maintain those in effective and long-standing ways , but it certainly didn't sound very creative .

But just to double down on the numbers , there's no reference to how many the pastoral shortage and the churches that will inevitably close without pastors to serve them , especially as the next generation as we move from six to three . This is about the only number that I 6,000 to 3,000 active pastors by 2030 , somewhere in there . What happens ?

Oh God , bless them , but what happens to a lot of those churches who need faithful or sacrament ministers of the gospel ? So , what are the goals , right ? What are the goals for new pastors needed and then , how does that form ? You know the way the seminaries go about innovating possibly new ways to meet those goals .

I firmly believe right now , john , we're living in the midst of a gap where we need more second career Bible-cational leaders and , again , the test we're running with companies based theological education , I think is something that should be explored For a variety of reasons . I'm not gonna go on that rant right now .

But , yeah , there's so much opportunity and I do believe that districts , in their unique context , need to be given more of a voice and more freedom , in partnership with the seminaries , in exploring those ways of raising up leaders into the next generation . So that's that , anything else to add on formation , john .

I mean , as much as we push the post college right into seminary , roll out into a parish by yourself out somewhere , I think that the learning curve for a 26-year-old coming out of seminary to jump into full-time ministry with everything on his plate maybe he's got a family , maybe he's single the learning curve , I think , continues to increase because more of us

were on the same page 50 years ago , 10 years ago , even , like as a graduate in 2020 and to the graduates that are coming out in 2025 , I think that

that learning curve is gonna be so much steeper for the young guys because of the difference in generational perspectives , understanding of how the world is interconnected , and so second career offers so much wisdom and some of that much needed kind of buffer and credibility , and yet it's harder and harder for that to take place .

I mean it was even in the Pastor Information Committee report . In the convention workbook . It said one of our objectives is to try and show the value , and then it listed what it takes to go through a residential program , upgrading your family , moving across the country and then being sent out wherever God might send you .

So there's a recognition of the gravity of this and yet kind of a failure to see that that's sometimes that's a price that that's really hard to pay and it may not be necessary because you could be so much more effective in it in a context you're already well established in that you already know that you already have relationships with and we don't really talk

about other than SMP and we talk about SMP as oh , that's how we do contextual ministry .

But you look at how SMP is regarded in the resolutions in the convention workbook , and one I think it's sadly kind of discounted , and and and two it said we are overdoing SMP , we're doing it too much , we're taking advantage of program , we're making it too convenient and it should only be for very special circumstances and it's like well , if we don't want to

do more SMP and we also recognize it's such a high price to do residential ministry , how are we going to cover that gap ? so it's just , it's just . It's just confusing a little bit . But you know the numbers , you know we've got hope . I do believe that you know . Conversations are how we make this happen .

And what better way to have conversations and throwing 1500 us into a room together in Milwaukee for five days for five days .

I care for what's going on at Concordia Texas , but obviously I'm a we're both boots on the ground . We're getting after it here . I think the conversation we just had needs to have ample , ample room rather than the call the question . But as you look at , as you look at the C U S , you know 704 C U S conversation and 703 .

What are some of your thoughts ?

But but for a thousand delegates to take on the role of arbiter in that disagreement and that situation and and we talked about this a little bit maybe before the call that you know that the opportunity for the delegates to wrap their minds around the situation has really only been two and a half months , which we received that information six , seven months after

the interactions actually took place at the national level between Don Christian , between Matt Harrison and the visitation team , and so it's challenging for us to to to try and sift through the accounts that are out there , whether it be from staff at Concordia Texas , you might know , or Senate , senate publications , or just Senate staff and so so , on the one hand ,

I think caution would be good and opportunity to hear things out a little better .

I'm saddened that the closures of Portland and Bronxville are probably going to be very much overshadowed , and I just remember how , how significant of a role the closure at Selma played at the 2019 convention and just really how important and symbolically valuable that situation was , and there were some very hard moments and some very , I mean , and I don't think we're

going to have the time to process that . It doesn't sound like there's really anything in there except for give thanks for the great work they did and say goodbye .

And then , when it comes to 704 , the restructuring resolution , I mean I encourage people to just click on the link and scroll through it and see one how long it takes you just to get through the material without reading it and then to pause and actually try and read a few of the bullet points and recognize this is a broad , sweeping change .

And the resolution itself says this is too complex for a convention to simply make one broad sweeping change . And yet here's how we do , you know , and and I think that that's something that really deserves a little bit more caution , a little bit more time .

I know we feel the urgency because Texas is done their thing and we've got that situation to try and figure out and reconcile . And so there's this urgency of we got to figure out this restructuring . We've got it , we've got to make this decision right now and the truth is the church isn't going anywhere , the gospel is not going anywhere .

Let's give ourselves the time we need to make this kind of administrative structural decision .

This is totally out of breath , doesn't need to be the deciding factor of this and article convention , and I think I'm a little worried that it will be and and , like you said , we're going to miss out on some of those other pastoral formation , priest of all believers , leveraging the value and treasure and beauty we have in the confessions for our mission , witness

. It's , it's so , you know , it's , it's in my thoughts and in my prayers . But those are , those are really the thoughts that have been kind of crowding my mind in preparation for the convention .

You know all the all the old timers are gonna be looking , oh , look at that . And then they're either gonna listen to your speaker , like , well , this kid's got some some uh courage and Some wisdom to offer to the , the wider church . So thank you for Representing our beloved church body now of 175 Years .

Praise be to God for the faithful work of the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod and I pray we function in a healthy , disagreeing , agreeably , a healthy way , offer the elevation of the name of Jesus that people on the outside Will look at the way we treat one another and say , wow , their followers of the crucified and risen one , his name is Jesus the Christ .

This is lead . Time sharing is caring . Please like , subscribe . We'll have a number of these bonus episodes coming out in the upcoming weeks and as we go to Synod convention , john , we get back and we say , alright , jesus , the church is yours , let's do ministry at the local level .

So that's right , you know it's , it's a joint . Thank you for the opportunity to just chat and to listen and to Reflect together , and I'm excited to see what God does amen , amen .

Thanks for listening and stay tuned for next week's episode I .