LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1981, Page 63

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Introduction

A sincere welcome to all of you as members of the
floor committees for the 54th regular convention of The
Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod, to be held here in
Et. Louis. The Synod is deeply grateful to you for your
Willingness to serve your Lord and church in the
important and challenging responsibilities which rest
upon you in this area of Christian service. You will be
preparing recommendations to guide both the conven-
tion and also over 6,000 congregations as they carry on
their mission and ministry for the work of the Lord
Jesus Christ.

- Floor committees are an essential part of the conven-

tion of the Synod and have great responsibilities. Your
proposals weigh heavily on the thinking and decisions
of the convention. You will be asked not only as a
committee but as committee members for your thinking
and suggestions. Therefore we want you to ask hard
questions and to base your decisions on the greatest
possible amount of information available to you in
order to make recommendations to the convention for
informed and intelligent decisions, as we walk together
in The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod. We certainly
invoke the power of God’s Holy Spirit upon your
deliberation.
- Dr. Herbert Mueller will be orienting you on the
precise duties of floor committees and the way in which
they are to carry out their work. I would like at this time
to bring certain matters to your attention which are of
particular importance. I would like to comment on some
of the major issues facing the convention and each floor
committee. This is not to minimize those overtures and
reports on which time does not permit me to comment.

1. Missions

The floor committee on Missions will note that the
Synod is extremely active in reaching out with the
Gospel to all sorts and conditions of men in all parts of
the world: North America, among Indians, on cam-
puses, among the deaf and the blind, to Hispanics, to
Asians, and to Blacks. You will notice that work is
carried on in almost every continent of the world among
all levels of culture and all conditions of men.

You will note the need for the recruitment of more
missionaries to enter the open doors which face us on
every hand. .

With reference to the overture on comity arrange-
ments, I would suggest that you invite several District
Presidents from various parts of the church to give you
input on this matter. We need the consultation of all
those who are involved in the comity arrangements.

Under the Board for Evangelism, we need to note the
joyous fact that finally our loss figures have turned

63

PRESIDENT’S REPORT

(Part I was read to the joint meeting of the floor committees in May; Part I, to the convention.)

(Part I)

around and that the church showed a small net growth
during 1980. However, we need to remember that there
has been a loss of 50,000 members every year for the
past 10 years. This whole matter of back door losses
needs great study and must be researched beyond the
resolutions of this convention.

You will note several overtures on Campus Ministry,
and this is a subject about which I hope the floor
committee can be helpful to the Synod. This is an
ongoing source of controversy and conflict among us.

So is the matter of participation in the Indian Desk of
LCUSA or the National Indian Lutheran Board. We are
proposing (and I certainly endorse) the idea of encour-
aging Word and Sacrament ministries among Indians
in our nation and in Canada. The NILB is basically a
social ministry agency, and should not be confused with
a Word and Sacrament ministry. You will notice that
the Board of Social Ministry and World Relief encour-
ages continued involvement with the NILB, while
many others favor withdrawing from it. I hope that the
floor committee will hear both sides of this matter and
try to arrive at an equitable and proper solution to it.

Overture 1-23 on opening Black congregations merits
our strong support.

I certainly endorse Overture 1-28 that another Great
Commission Convocation be held. This was an exciting
and wonderful event in the life of our church. Let’s have
another.

I also favor Overture 1-35, “To Establish Synodical
Goals in Evangelism.” We have had wonderful success
in establishing a financial goal for Forward in Remem-
brance and far exceeding it. I believe if we would
recognize that what we are even more interested in than
money is the souls and lives of people, and if the idea of
planning and working toward evangelism outreach is
really to be taken seriously in our church, we really must
establish goals and not be satisfied until these goals,
however modest, may have been reached. If we had
spent as much time and effort on evangelism as we have
on Forward in Remembrance, I believe we would have
shown similar success. This requires diligent work on
the part of pastors and congregations, and I believe our
Board for Evangelism is more than willing to help in
every possible way. I hope that we can do something to
reverse our losses and to show that we really believe in
the Great Commission.

2. Task Force II

In general I believe that the report of the Task Force
is a good one, and I hope it will be adopted. We all have
some items that we are not quite enamored of, and we
probably will always have such. But remember that