LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2013, Page 63

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SYNOD REPORTS
Jesus are abundant. But this is not without challenges, which call for
reliance upon the Lord. An Omaha congregation in partnership with
People of the Book Lutheran Outreach (POBLO) is offering Christian
outreach to Muslims for the Holy Spirit to bring them from Islam
into faith in Christ alone for life and salvation. Missional Leadership
Conferences are being offered for pastors and principals and will
begin to include lay participation in 2013.
The District continues its Lay Leadership Program in partnership
with Concordia University Nebraska to train congregational members
for special service in assisting their pastors, teachers, and DCEs. The
Lay Leadership Program also provides courses to those men who are
preparing to enter into the Synod’s Specific Ministry Pastor (SMP)
program. Six district congregations currently have SMP vicars.
The Nebraska District is blessed with two LWML districts and an
LLL district. Mission and outreach partnerships are strong with the
LWML and LLL districts. The Nebraska District will host a Lutheran
Hour Regional Outreach Conference in 2013.
The district has strong commitment to assisting the Evangelical
Lutheran Church in Sudan/South Sudan (ELCS/SS) to emerge as a
strong confessional Lutheran Church. The district is coordinating with
the LCMS Office of International Mission and Orphan Grain Train
to send Sudanese American LCMS Pastor John Deang and his wife,
Martha, to assist Bishop Wilson Noah Rule of the ELCS/SS. As the
Nebraska District looks to the future, congregations, schools, pastors,
missionaries, teachers, other commissioned workers, and lay leaders are focused on the Lord’s strength as they encourage one another
with these words: “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the
proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as
we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to the
family of believers.”
Russell L. Sommerfeld, President
R3-03-18

New England District
On June 14–16, 2012, the members of the New England District
gathered in convention at the Sheraton in Springfield, Massachusetts,
to recognize and celebrate God’s mission work among the saints of
the NED-LCMS. This convention was one of transition, as with sorrow but also a “well done, good and faithful!,” we said good-bye to
our retiring District President Rev. James Keurulainen. As his successor elected at that convention, I can only stand in praise before the
Lord for my predecessor, and my sincerest prayer is that I can follow
in his footsteps—yes, in my own pair of Christ-given shoes, but with
the humility of recognizing that I could have no finer example of a
district president than in the man who came before me.
With a new era upon us in New England, we moved forward
under the desire to be (a) missional, (b) collegial, and (c) pastoral in
how we approach ministry in this part of the Lord’s harvest fields.
Mission outreaches continue with a nontraditional church plant in
Marlborough, Massachusetts, with a desire to expand church planting possibilities and with an intentional outreach ministry in Boston
to Portuguese peoples and to college students. A Missions Blueprint
has been revised and updated for continued use in our district. We
have revitalized and strengthened our district’s relationship with our
partners in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Kenya and welcomed
a visit from Bishop Walter Obare. Part of that connection focused on
our involvement with Lutheran Malaria Initiative (LMI). I am happy
to report that our district’s goals set by LMI were reached and surpassed, and support is ongoing. In the area of missions, I have voiced
a goal of every congregation in our district having an internationalfocused mission, of which our Kenyan and Portuguese connections
provide ample opportunities, though there are other nations and

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people groups to which we reach out with Christ’s love. We encourage every congregation to adopt a national mission, and our beloved
Synod provides numerous opportunities to support Synod work in
the US and with the work of other ministries. We encourage every
congregation to adopt a local mission as it reaches out to its community. One example is “Hands of Grace,” started by our congregation
in northwest Connecticut. The church, located off the beaten path,
has rented space on Main Street in its town and in one year provided
12,000 meals to the community, bags upon bags of clean clothing,
and prayer and Christian counseling to the hurting of the towns in that
area. The district also maintains an active connection to Transforming
Churches Network and has learning groups for pastors. It has also provided church consultations for congregations wishing to revitalize,
and now offers “hinge events” for the same mission outreach revitalization purposes. As a former member of a TCN learning group,
I took to heart one lesson learned there, which is called “The CBS
Plan,” encouraging each congregation to focus on “Calling, Building,
Sending.” It recognizes that the first occurs primarily in worshiping
and meeting Jesus Christ and that the second occurs when the Word
of God and the Sacraments build us up in the Lord; it then realizes
the biblical outpouring that flows from these: sending!! Many congregations have also reinforced their mission work with the addition
of an SMP (specific ministry pastor) vicar or pastor to their staff, and
we thank the Synod for providing SMP resources and training to us.
The district also takes to heart the Synod theme of “Mercy, Witness,
and Life Together,” and such was the theme for our 2012 convention.
On a practical note, in addition to the 20 percent that the district currently contributes as nondesignated funds, the district in convention
voted to designate another 5 percent of all district receipts to specific
LCMS missions, agencies, and RSOs.
The New England District has also had its share of trials and heartaches. In the last triennium, we lost a significant number of pastors to
the attacks of Satan. The evil one struck at the marriages and homes
of our pastors and church workers. As such, we made a commitment
to monitor, help, and strengthen the physical, spiritual, and mental
health of the district’s church workers and church-worker marriages
and families. We have had a one-day retreat for all pastors with Dr.
Bruce Hartung to discuss how we can “Hold Up the Prophet’s Hands.”
We intend to have a repeat of that same retreat, if possible, in 2013
with congregation presidents and lay leaders joining us. Our spring
pastors conference will have a focus on church-worker marriages with
marriage and family counselors from the Florida-Georgia District
leading us and joining us. We have received monetary grants to help us
reach our goal of having every pastor’s wife come to that spring conference with her husband. A 2013 pastors’ wives conference may take
up a similar theme as our sisters in Christ meet together to strengthen
one another and defeat Satan’s goal to isolate us and divide us from
Christ, our spouses, our earthly families, and our family in Christ.
Hurricane Sandy left its mark in our area, although by God’s grace
we did not suffer as our Christian family did in the Atlantic and New
Jersey Districts. Our district in support had a “Feeding Children
Everywhere” event, where we packaged 25,000 meals which were
delivered to New York and New Jersey, including 200 “flood buckets” to help with Hurricane Sandy cleanup and restoration. Two more
“Feeding Children Everywhere” events are now scheduled in two of
our district congregations!
We also suffered the tragedy at Newtown, Connecticut. Words
cannot express the horror of this personal nightmare for us in New
England. But we have reached out to our brothers and sisters at Christ
the King Lutheran Church in Newtown with her pastor, Rev. Rob
Morris. They have been beacons of hope in Christ to their community
and to the world. There were tense moments in our walking together
as a Synod in the aftermath of that crisis. But we all, with our brothers
2013 Convention Workbook