The Convention can help Pastor Harrison as he takes the reins of leadership in the LC-MS. He needs a support team. Tuesday saw the convention decide that the president needs pastors and laity in office around him who can work with him, share his vision and complement his style. They then gave Pastor Harrison a slate of vice presidents who will certainly work closely with him as he moves the Synod forward. Wednesday saw a Board of Directors elected that will work to support his vision. Thursday you can help with more people who can work with him by using The United List as a guide for your elections.

For delegates, pick up The United List from the gathering place in your hotel or on the second floor, to the right of the registration desk on the second floor of the Convention Center. You can also access it on The United List site by the pdf here.

If one member suffers, all suffer together. If one rejoices, all rejoice together. Right now there are many rejoicing and there are many suffering. Luther says when you’re walking along and you strike your little toe on a chair or a table, a table leg, what happens is the whole body bends over, the face grimaces and grabs that little toe. And there’s no use saying “that’s just a little toe,” because the whole body suffers.

This I realize is a tumultuous change in the life of our Synod. I wish to thank President Kieschnick for his heart for evangelism, and his deep desire to move this Synod forward. Many are suffering, and it will be very challenging times to work together.

I wish to inform you that you have kept your perfect record of electing sinners as presidents of the Missouri Synod. [applause] I guarantee you I will sin and fail. I will fall short. I will sin against you. I wish also to say, that right now I forgive all who have in any way have sinned against me or anybody else, and plead your forgiveness for anything that I said or did that offended you. I beg of you your prayers, I beg of you your daily prayers and intercession. These are challenging times. I promise you that I will be as straight with you as I possibly can, to the best of my ability, guided by the Spirit of God. I pledge to you that I will not coerce you. I will do my best by the Word of Christ to lead with a generous Gospel of Jesus Christ, which forgives us all of our sins, and motivates us to love and care for our neighbor in mercy and compassion. And I will work as hard as I possibly can for unity around the clear and compelling Word of God and nothing else.

I wish to just introduce my dear wife to you, Kathy. Please Kathy, would you stand. [applause]

I’m so impressed by you at this convention, how you have borne with one another, been patient, asked for forgiveness. This is the greatest privilege and honor of one’s life to stand before this body in this fashion. I could never imagine it. And I pray the Lord will bless you in the days to come to work for unity and love and compassion, that the Gospel of Christ may go forth from all of us, in every single place, everywhere around the world, that many may know, many many more may know, the Gospel of Jesus for eternal life. The Lord be with you. [“And also with you.” Applause.]

06-28-2010: The Truth about the Stewardship of LCMS World Relief and Human Care

For the sake of our work of mercy and those in need around the world, and to provide reassurance to our donors, it is necessary to respond to the Jesus First Delegate Letter No. 9. As chairman of the Board for Human Care, I have requested our board Vice Chair, John Edson (a Certified Public Accountant), to prepare a response.

Rev. Bernie Seter
Chair, Board for Human Care

http://stand-firm.blogspot.com/2010/06/meet-pastor-matt-harrison.html

Cross Focused Leadership for Missouri site.

Immediately following the Ordination/Installation service the Harrisons received word that Kathy’s sister-in-law had just died of cancer. What was the new pastor to do? He had not even preached his first sermon! My counsel was that Kathy and the family needed him. The congregation had survived my pastoral leadership for several months so they could put up with me one more week! Pastor Harrison reluctantly agreed.

I didn’t have to be around Matt long before I realized that this young man had a remarkable grasp of Holy Scripture and the Lutheran Confessions. There was no doubt that he was an orthodox, conservative, confessional Lutheran Theologian, but was he a PASTOR? The one does not necessarily the other make! The first glimmer of hope came by way of a phone call.

Pastor Harrison had discovered that a young couple was living together without the benefit of marriage. Pastor Harrison called me to seek advice on how to deal with this situation. I must confess, I was very pleasantly surprised. The question was not, “Is this a sin?” The question was, how could he deal with this in a pastoral way. Matt was not simply concerned about the correct theological answer, he was concerned about how to apply the correct theological answer in a loving, caring, pastoral way. Not only is he a remarkable theologian, he has a pastoral heart!

In Westgate the morning gathering place for coffee was the local tavern. Pastor Harrison was frequently one of the guys that gathered to chat about the weather and whatever else was exciting in Westgate! The mark of a good pastor is meeting people where they are. That seemed to come naturally for Rev. Harrison. His pastoral concern for God’s people showed up again and again as we discussed matters of casuistry in our circuit conferences. Perhaps most telling of all is the fact that I never received one single phone call from any member of St. Peter complaining about their pastor!

Small town and rural congregations have learned that when they receive a talented young pastor in all likelihood the Lord is going to, sooner or later, call him to a larger and more challenging ministry. For Pastor Harrison that call came in 1995 to Zion Lutheran Church, Fort Wayne, Indiana.

And so, once again I was asked to serve St. Peter Lutheran Church as vacancy pastor. It is funny how, as I grow older, I sometimes have trouble remembering important things, but some little incident is indelibly etched in my mind. One such incident occurred soon after I started serving at Westgate for the second time. I was there for some midweek evening event. As I was walking to the back of the church a young boy, perhaps 10 or 11 years old, stopped to tell me, “A lot of people think ‘Isaiah, Mighty Seer in Days of Old’ is hard to sing, but it ain’t!” There was no doubt in my mind that this boy had been sitting at the feet of Pastor Harrison who taught the kids to sing “Isaiah, Mighty Seer…” while strumming on his banjo! As I served the members of St. Peter I repeatedly heard what a good shepherd Rev. Harrison had been and how they wished he had not been called away.

In 2003, after I had become District President of Iowa District East and Harrison was Executive Director of LCMS World Relief and Human Care, Matt approached me about the possibility of Iowa District East teaming up with LCMS World Relief and Human Care to build a facility for a congregation in Palanga, Lithuania. He had visited Palanga and learned that the congregation’s church facility had burned to the ground in 1938. Under the Soviets they were not allowed to rebuild and then, with the economic disaster created by the Soviets, the congregation could not afford to build it themselves. Once again Rev. Harrison’s pastoral heart was showing through. These Lutheran brothers and sisters in Palanga needed a facility where they could gather for worship and from which they could carry out their diaconal ministry.

The writings Harrison has produced the last few years reveal, not only his theological expertise and pastoral heart, but also his humility and his great sense of humor! Check out his latest, “A Little Book on Joy.” (Lutheran Legacy)

I believe that the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod needs a President who is both a superb theologian and an excellent pastor. I also firmly believe that the Rev. Matthew Harrison is such a man.

Rev. Gary M. Arp
Past President of Iowa District East

When he spoke at our District Convention last year, one of our older pastors (and a dear friend of mine) came up to me afterward and with all earnestness looked me in the eye to ask: “Has anyone ever thought of HIM being elected Synodical President?” My friend doesn’t do blogs or email or any such. I smiled and told him that yes, the thought had crossed a mind or two.

Why did my friend so gravitate to Pastor Harrison? Well, first know that my friend is a true evangelical catholic. A man who has sought for many years to lead his beloved flock in living from the Eucharist as the very center of the Church’s life, the deep wellspring of her hidden joy and letting that Eucharist shape our mission as church in this world. As my friend listened to Pastor Harrison deliver high-octane Gospel to the assembly in that scholarly and yet utterly engaging, popular way he has, my friend realized the deepest truth about Harrison: “That man” he said to me “is a pastor at heart.” And he was right.

It was Holy Week when Issues, Etc. was suddenly and inexplicably yanked off the air, and the producer of that show – a member of my parish, with a very sick wife – faced a most uncertain future. What would happen? I thought it typical Harrison for him to show up at our parish on Maundy Thursday, bringing Bishop Obare’s son along with him. He was there to feast on the Word and on our Lord’s body and blood, to be sure. But he was also there to be a friend to Jeff Schwarz, to speak a personal word of comfort to him in the time of his trial. 30 miles outside of St. Louis through the cornfields he had driven, just to worship with a hurting church and a hurting family that evening. It’s the sort of thing he does. “A pastor at heart.”

And besides this pastoral heart that rejoices in God’s infinite mercy reaching and transforming us in the means of grace, he is a man who has consistently shown a deep concern for the Church’s mercy ministry. Before he ended up heading the mercy arm of the Missouri Synod, he had led an absolutely stunning effort in Fort Wayne to reclaim a neighborhood for its citizens. Partnering with the local Roman parish, he and his beloved Zion Lutheran Church began buying and renovating burned out, trashed houses all around the neighborhood. They went into them with hammers and saws, with paint and nails, they enlisted the citizen’s help and let them know that they were not alone and that those parishes were NOT abandoning their neighborhood. It was a time of rebirth in that part of Fort Wayne, and it was the success (a nationally noted success) of that work there that led directly to the Synod tapping Pr. Harrison to guide its mercy ministries throughout the world – a task he has handled with the same energy and zeal he showed in transforming a ghetto into a thriving neighborhood for love of Christ and the people there.

As he [Harrison] ponders the Synodical disarray that we continue to find ourselves in (the worship wars, the decline in evangelistic zeal among our people, the deterioration of our missionary work throughout the world, and so much more), he has proposed a plan for letting the Word of God do its work among us. He knows that true renewal will come in no other way. “The Word of God must do this thing, and not we poor sinners.” (Luther) You can read his plan at http://itistime.org.

All of that and so much more (that I’ll spare you) is why I support for Synodical President this banjo playing, hammer swinging, paint-brush wielding, masterful teaching servant of God (and fine scholar, to boot!), this man with a pastor’s heart, who gets that the Church literally lives from the Divine Service where the Gospel is preached and the Body and Blood of the Savior delivered into mouths and hearts to strengthen and enliven God’s people in faith toward the Blessed Trinity AND in fervent love toward one another. Yes, I believe it is HE we should elect as our next Synodical President. It’s time, Missouri. It’s time.

William Weedon, Pastor
St. Paul Lutheran Church
Hamel, IL

Reprinted with permission from the March 2010 issue of Forum Letter. Copyright 2010 by the American Lutheran Publicity Bureau. All rights reserved.