LCMS Convention Proceedings St. Louis, Missouri — 1981, Page 122

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out your directive. We have solicited and received
remendous amount of input, as never before in our
story, from you out there in the church. We have
spproached every Circuit of the Synod to receive
widance from all of you. You have responded nobly,
ying us the benefit of your experience and of your
king. We listened to you and made significant
yjhanges in our proposals as a result of your input.

Why a Synod?

Basic to the work of Task Force II was a review of
‘what the basic functions of the Synod really are. We
reminded ourselves that the Synod was called into
“heing for especially two reasons: 1. to serve in support of
‘ts member congregations and 2. to serve in behalf of its
member congregations. Let’s look briefly at each of
hese.

1. In support of the congregations. The Synod was

esigned to help the congregations and their members
+o preserve the purity of God’s Word and to assist the
~ congregations in their mission and ministry right where
they are. Through the years the Synod has therefore
provided many tools and helps in education, evan-
gelism, stewardship, and other phases of congregational
life and ministry.
2. In behalf of the congregations. In this respect the
Synod has reached out to other church bodies either to
‘establish or to maintain unity of confession and in that
way tocarry out the Scriptural directive to maintain the
‘unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. The Synod has
also served in behalf of the congregations by enabling
congregations to do together that which individual
congregations could not do by themselves or could not
do very well, such as foreign mission work and the
training of pastors and teachers at colleges and
seminaries.

These two basic functions of the Synod, to serve in
support of the congregations and in behalf of the
congregations, guided Task Force II in its proposals for
restructuring the various boards and commissions of
the Synod. These will be detailed for you in the visual
presentation that follows.

The Anaheim Directives

Furthermore, Task Force II took seriously the two
major directives which had been given to Task Force I
in 1975 by the Anaheim convention: 1. to preserve the
congregational polity of church government, and 2. to
avoid centralization of power within the synodical
structure itself. These two concerns are not two sides of
thesame coin but they do interrelate and influence each
other, and at certain points they intersect.

The Local Emphasis

One of the overriding concerns, then, of Task Force
II was to emphasize the role of the congregation and its
individual members in the life of the Synod. We
recognized a tragic development of recent years, namely,
a loss of a sense of ownership of the Synod on the part of
the man and woman in the pew. Our people have

SPECIAL PRESENTATION OF TASK FORCE II 123

Forward in
Remembrance

become accustomed to speaking of the Synod as “they”
instead of “we.” The Task Force discussed at length
ways in which the sense of ownership could be re-
captured. We are making several proposals which we
hope will enhance the role of the congregations and
make them more sensitive to the fact that they are the
Synod.

We have tried at every point to bring decision-
making down to the lowest level. (This constitutes true
decentralization!) We seek to reactivate the role of the
Circuit, since this is the synodical unit closest to the
local congregation. We are proposing that Circuit
Forums be introduced in every Circuit and we are
encouraging Circuits to consider the advisability of
having larger gatherings for inspiration, motivation,
education, and good old-fashioned fellowship at least
once every three years, possibly even more frequently.

To be of greater assistance to the local congregation
we recommend bringing together into one program
board, assisted by standing committees of specialists,
all of the activities that relate to the congregation, so
that the congregation will not be confused by being
approached from many different directions with con-
flicting timetables and sometimes even conflicting
recommendations. Duplication will be avoided and, we
trust, oversights, so that the Synod can be of greater
help to the local congregation.

The Franchise—the Local Prerogative

We have also devoted much time to the question of
franchise. From the beginning of our history every
congregation was to be accorded two votes. Since the
founding fathers of the Synod looked upon the Synod as
an extension of the congregation, they insisted that the
role of the pastor should be prominent in the Synod even
as it is in the congregation. So one of the two congre-
gational votes was to be cast by the pastor. Nevertheless,
it must also be recognized that the Synod is primarily
lay-oriented. It is the lay persons in the congregations
who decide who is to be called as their pastor and who.
therefore is to be designated by the lay people to cast
their pastoral vote at the conventions. The Task Force is
proposing that the congregation should also have a