The time for congregations to begin the nomination process is quickly approaching.

I’d like to humbly offer some suggestions as that time arrives:

1. Find out how and when your congregation will decide whom to nominate.
2. Encourage your congregation to nominate Rev. Harrison for president!
3. Each congregation may submit two names for nomination as President. Even if Harrison isn’t the only name your congregation suggests, he should be one of them!
4. Remember the nomination process closes in March of 2010.

It’s also worth thinking about nominations for other offices, in particular 1st Vice President. This is the only full-time VP position, and a key leader who can greatly assist the president.

We suggest each congregation nominates Rev. Herbert Mueller of the Southern Illinois District.

Rev. Herb Mueller

Rev. Mueller has served many years as a faithful District President and is well respected throughout the synod. You can see him in action here at the SID pastors conference, where he presented along with Rev. Harrison on the topic of “A Theological Approach to Unity“.

The following from ItIsTime.org :

The Southern Illinois District Pastoral Conference Spring Session was held on 30 April 2009 on the feast of St. Philip and St. James (translated) at Camp Wartburg. The theme for the conference was “A Theological Approach to Unity” presented by Rev. Matthew C. Harrison and District President, Rev. Herbert Mueller.The conference agenda can be downloaded here:

Agenda: A Theological Approach to Unity

Rev. Herbert Mueller, Southern Illinois District President, presented for the first 30 minutes. He presented on how the way the Missouri Synod church leaders handled the election controversy, particuarly in the 1880s, could serve as a model for theological unity today.

Click here for video of the presentation

Rev. Harrison is widely in demand for speaking engagements, at pastors’ conferences, district conventions, and other events around the synod.

You can hear and read his stuff at this central clearing-house: http://itistime.org/

There’s a schedule of his upcoming speaking events and lots of web-streaming video and other helpful resources. You should check it out!

If you haven’t had time yet to read Rev. Harrison’s piece, “It’s Time”, you can listen to it at:
http://itistime.org/

It’s available online or for download in mp3 format.

Also on the website is Chapter 1 of the Christ Have Mercy DVD.

Rev. Harrison’s paper, “It’s Time”, and related resources (text, audio, video), can be found at www.itistime.org

Rev. Harrison has posted the video from his presentation to the Southern Illinois District Convention.

You can watch “One Sure Hope” here, from his blog.

Statement of Rev. Matthew Harrison on ELCA’s Task Force on Sexuality Study

ST. LOUIS, Mo. – Yesterday the church commemorated the 463rd anniversary of the death of Martin Luther. His last written words, found on a note in his pocket, were “We are beggars: This is true.” Hermann Sasse regarded these final words as a summation of Luther’s great legacy to Christianity. In all matters of faith and life, Christians are beggars who receive what the Lord gives, and as the Lord gives. Salvation is all by grace, all by Christ’s doing. All that we are to believe and practice in the church is very clearly given in the Bible, God’s own infallible Word.

Today the ELCA’s Task Force for ELCA Studies on Sexuality released its “Report and Recommendation on Ministry Policies” (http://www.elca.org/faithfuljourney). The report recommends a path for the ELCA’s 2009 church-wide assembly to recognize and accept publicly accountable, lifelong, monogamous, same gender relationships of clergy in those synods (ELCA regional divisions) and congregations, which desire to approve of such relationships.

The LCMS position on homosexuality is that of the Bible and the church catholic from the very beginning. Revisionist readings of the Bible that assert otherwise are deeply dependent upon views of the Bible that are at odds with its self-definition as God’s very Word.

We at LCMS World Relief and Human Care (LCMS Board for Human Care) have many tasks mandated by the Missouri Synod, which involve a great deal of interaction and partnership with ELCA offices, entities, affiliated agencies, and individuals. We have sought to carry out these mandated tasks with complete and uncompromising fidelity with charity, faithful to the LCMS’s clearly stated positions, including those on human sexuality. This task is becoming ever more complex, and the proposals of the ELCA task force promise to increase this complexity greatly. We will continue to the best of our ability to ensure that service organizations recognized by the LCMS “respect and do not act contrary to” (6.2.1 LCMS 2007 Handbook: Constitution, Bylaws, Articles of Incorporation, page 200) the biblical position of the LCMS on this issue.

To say that we are disappointed in the Task Force proposals would be a vast understatement. But we are not surprised. We are deeply concerned about many ELCA friends (on both sides of the issue) and especially about those who find themselves holding the orthodox position while their beloved church body slips into heterodoxy. But we do not write in order to self-righteously castigate the ELCA. Rather in deep humility and repentance, we think of our own many and deep sins: our own failure to hear the word of God; our failure to bear convincing witness on this issue; our own deep sins and our lack of love for one another, which have often rendered our witness of no effect; our lack of love and failure to reach out “with might and main” to those who struggle with the issue of homosexuality.

Today, Feb. 19, 2009, is a day of deep repentance. Join me in praying for the future of the Lutheran church, in America and throughout the world. Please join me too, in praying for the hundreds of Lutheran agencies, which faithfully struggle to serve those in need. We are beggars: This is true.

Rev. Matthew Harrison
Executive Director
LCMS World Relief and Human Care

(For a further discussion on this topic from a biblical and Lutheran Confessional viewpoint please see Armin Wenz’s The Contemporary Debate on Homosexual Clergy published by LCMS World Relief and Human Care.)

The Study guide companion document to “It’s Time” by Rev. Harrison is now available. Click here to view the .pdf file.

The “It’s Time” document is also available here.

Rev. Harrsion has released an important paper, well worth your attention:

“It’s Time”
LCMS UNITY AND MISSION -
The Real Problem We Face
and How to Solve It

We will post highlights of the paper soon, but you can read all of it at the link above.

I’ve added a page to this blog which gives an approximate timeline of important events leading up to the 2010 convention. See the tab above, “Timeline”. I will try to keep it up to date as more information comes out.

-delegate2007