# LCMS Convention Proceedings_St. Louis Missouri_1956_S181
# Machine transcription, uncorrected — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

SEMINARIES AND COLLEGES 181

ness. It shows itself as willingness to.learn, as eagerness to succeed,
as an intense urge to serve.

To say that the recruit for the church professions must be
academically competent with above-average scholastic ability and
achievement is not to put an absolute premium on scholastic
ability and achievement only. It is merely a reminder that men
and women of mean and limited horizons are not likely to be able
to bear effective witness of the Gospel for the world, that theology
is an area of learning, that the divine prescription of the ability
to teach cannot be met by the individual who is unable to learn.
To be genuinely professionally competent implies that an indi-
vidual is able to study and work with others and can also grow
professionally on an individual basis. The young recruits who are
already effective in work habits and study skills are far more
likely to be successful in training and in later service than those
who are not.

The recruit is also to be socially competent, with a strong
‘preference for social participation. He is to be able to learn to
understand, and to be able to learn to work with, people as persons.
He is to be one who is warm and genuine in his approach to
people of all ages and conditions. Already the recruit is to be
actively and not merely theoretically concerned about persons.

Even the youngest recruit is to be economically dependable.
As an index of character, money is more than a medium of
exchange. Individual stewardship of money and possessions, his

own and others, is an important insight into his entire character.

The very names which the Holy Scriptures apply to those who
exercise the office of the ministry in the church point to the
ministry as a calling to effective and responsible leadership.
Leaders of the church are not born but are made. Recruits are
to be able to lead.

All this adds up to a person who, appropriate to his level of
growth and development, is wholesome in character, who in his
growth toward maturity is increasingly integrated and self-
disciplined.

How many of such young men and young women are the
priceless resource of the congregations of The Lutheran Church —
Missouri Synod? There are no census figures which can be used
as a clue. Among the many thousands of young men and women
who annually are added to the communicant membership of Synod,
there are many hundreds who are likely to go unnoticed, unidenti-
fied, and unmotivated, unless a systematic and continuous recruit-
ment effort seeks to help them to the appropriate stage of the
' synodical training program.