LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2010, Page 67

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SYNOD REPORTS
team of LCMS representatives transported medical supplies and tents
into Haiti from the Dominican Republic within 10 days of the earthquake. Aid efforts are continuing through the present time.
c. Japan Lutheran Church

The Missouri Synod’s partner church in Japan, the Japan Lutheran
Church (JLC), received a proposal at its 14th General Convention in
May 2008 to ordain women to the pastoral office. LCMS President
Kieschnick extended an offer to have the two churches discuss this
issue, “since a decision to ordain women would have serious implications for a relationship which our two churches have enjoyed for so
many years.” In response, the JLC convention resolved to discuss the
issue with the LCMS before making a decision. Since that time, representatives of the Synod and the JLC have met on three occasions,
in February and September 2009 and in February 2010. The LCMS
has been represented by Dr. Samuel H. Nafzger, Director of Church
Relations; Dr. Joel D. Lehenbauer, Executive Director of the CTCR;
and Dr. Gerhard Michael, former missionary to Japan and past president of the Florida-Georgia District.
In the first round of discussions, the participants in these talks
focused their attention on “the history, the position, and the situation of the service of women” in each church body. In round two,
each church body presented a careful study of what the Scriptures
teach about the service of women in the church. In round three, the
participants sought to clarify points of agreement and disagreement
and discussed questions about the implications of a possible decision
by the JLC to ordain women. This latter issue will be the focus of a
fourth and final round of discussions planned for August 29–30, 2010.
The JLC grew out of LCMS mission work in Japan beginning in
1948. It was organized as an autonomous church in 1968 and became
an LCMS partner church in 1971.
d. Lutheran Church—Canada

Representatives of the LCMS and the Lutheran Church—Canada
meet a minimum of one time each year to discuss areas of mutual
interest and cooperation as partner churches. Recent meetings were
held in St. Louis on November 5, 2008, and November 9–10, 2009.
The latter meeting included an opportunity for interaction and conversation with members of the AALC-LCMS Commission on Fellowship
(see item 2 a above).
e. Lutheran Church in Korea

The Lutheran Church in Korea (LCK) celebrated 50 years of
Lutheran mission work in Korea in October 2008. Representing the
LCMS on this occasion was Dr. Samuel Nafzger, Director of Church
Relations and Assistant to the President.
The LCK presented a plaque to the LCMS which reads:
The congregation and members of the Lutheran Church in Korea present this plaque of appreciation to The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod
with profound appreciation for sending four missionary families 50 years
ago for the sake of proclaiming the Gospel of Christ in a country devastated by war. By God’s grace, and as a result of that initiative, the Lutheran
Church in Korea exists today. For this reason we give thanks to God first
of all, and also to the Synod, in this 50th anniversary year of Lutheran mission work in Korea.

Today, the Lutheran Church in Korea has 42 congregations, 53
pastors, and 5,060 baptized members. Through the Bethel Bible Study
program, it has led 450,000 individuals and 15,000 clergy in its part
of the world in the study of the Bible.

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3. Relationships with Other International Lutheran Churches and
Confessing Movements
a. Ethiopian Evangelical Church—Mekane Yesus

The Ethiopian Evangelical Church—Mekane Yesus (EECMY) is
the largest Lutheran church body in Africa, with over 6 million members. Although the LCMS and the EECMY are not in altar and pulpit
fellowship, in recent years a mutually beneficial relationship has
developed between the two church bodies. Ethiopian students have
studied at LCMS seminaries through the CRISP program. EECMY
pastors have become members of the Synod and served in various
capacities and locations.
During the 2007–9 triennium, Dr. Berhanu Ofgaa, an EECMY
pastor with post-graduate degrees from both of our LCMS seminaries,
became an LCMS pastor. In August 2009, Dr. Ofgaa was elected by
the EECMY to be its general secretary. In this position, he is responsible for the administration of the church at large, serving next to the
recently elected president of the EECMY, Dr. Wakseyoum Idosa.
Dr. Tilahun Mekonnen Mendedo, formerly a pastor in the EECMY
who had earned a doctorate from Concordia Theological Seminary,
Fort Wayne, also has become a pastor in the LCMS. In December
2009, he was elected to serve as president of Concordia College in
Selma, Alabama.
In January 2010, representatives from the LCMS and EECMY
signed a document titled Partnership Agreement between the
Ethiopian Evangelical Church—Mekane Yesus and the Department
of World Missions Representing The Lutheran Church—Missouri
Synod. This document outlines a mutual commitment to work toward
doctrinal agreement as the basis for altar and pulpit fellowship.
A representative of the EECMY has been invited to the
Confessional Leadership Conference in June 2010 (see item I C 3
above).
b. Mission Province of Sweden and Finland

The Mission Province of Sweden and Finland is a free province of
pastors and congregations in the Lutheran Church in Sweden that seek
to remain faithful to the Scriptures and the Lutheran Confessions. In
its desire to remain faithful, it has opposed the Church of Sweden’s
decisions to ordain women to the pastoral office, to bless and to
perform gender neutral “marriages,” and to ordain noncelibate homosexual persons. While the Mission Province has a significant history
of missions and church planting, it is not recognized by the Church
of Sweden, seminarians who share its beliefs have been denied ordination, some of its pastors have been defrocked, and the Province
has been denied the right to have a bishop officially recognized by
the Church of Sweden. All requests from the Mission Province to
talk with leaders of the Church of Sweden have been denied. In May
2009, the staff of the CTCR and the Director of Church Relations, Dr.
Nafzger, met with representatives of the Mission Province, including
Dr. Bengt Birgersson, its general secretary, for the purpose of encouraging the cause of biblical, confessional Lutheranism in Sweden.
c. Siberian Evangelical Lutheran Church

Representatives of the Siberian Evangelical Lutheran Church
(SELC) and The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod (LCMS) met
at the LCMS International Center in St. Louis on January 27, 2010,
to begin discussions that leaders of both church bodies anticipate
will lead to formal altar and pulpit fellowship. At this initial meeting, SELC Bishop Vsevolod Lytkin expressed appreciation for his
church body’s relationship with the LCMS, which began in the 1990s.
He provided a brief history of the SELC which led to its official
licensing by the Russian government in 2002, his consecration as
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