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LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 2026, Page 211

Scan: The Lutheran Church—Missouri Synod

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THEOLOGICAL DOCUMENTS—COMMISSION ON THEOLOGY AND CHURCH RELATIONS
xi.
Develop more robust continuing education programs and expectations for all LCMS
pastors—general and SMP.
c. Strengthening our commitment to high quality theological education by extension
i.
Continue the SMP program and emphasize the need for ongoing mentoring and
intellectual/theological growth.
a) Adhere rigorously to SMP criteria for admission, discouraging the temptation to
make SMP a means of avoiding the residential route toward ordination.
b) Ensure vigorous, ongoing mentoring for SMP candidates, vicars, and pastors with
clear lines of accountability.
c) Encourage SMP individuals to continue their studies toward general ministry and
to pursue further theological education.
d) Provide needed financial assistance for SMP candidates.
e) Develop a process by which, in limited and controlled circumstances, worthy
individuals may be colloquized as Specific Ministry Pastors. This may include
provision for strict background checks, additional theological education as
needed, strong supervision and mentoring during and beyond the colloquy
process, and other steps to discourage any temptation for this to become a means
of avoiding the highest possible training for ministerial candidates.
ii.
Continue the EIIT and Center for Hispanic Studies programs.
a) This is necessary in order to increase the numbers of confessional Lutheran
pastors who can serve interculturally. (We should not, however, direct qualified
and capable minority students away from residential pastoral education.)
b) Provide needed financial assistance for EIIT candidates.
c) Ensure vigorous, ongoing mentorship for all EIIT graduates.
d. Expanding immigrant ministries by working with international partner churches to
provide pastors for specific immigrant groups (e.g., African Immigrant congregations).
e. When over a prolonged period of time there are no available pastors to serve a
congregation, mission, or ministry, the Synod may address immediate and ongoing needs
for care of such congregations through auxiliary ministers and lay leaders. It should be
understood that any implementation of the following suggestions is to be done while
continuing to make every effort to provide pastors to serve such congregations.
i.
Flexibility regarding both service times and even the day of worship should be
explored when there is a prolonged vacancy. Such changes as time and date may
allow the development of a dual parish call or enable an ordained pastor to serve the
congregation either regularly or occasionally.
ii.
Called male commissioned ministers may lead Sunday services without the Lord’s
Supper as needed, utilizing sermons prepared by ordained ministers.
iii. Male laymen who are approved by districts and trained to lead services may lead
Sunday worship without the Lord’s Supper, utilizing sermons prepared by ordained
ministers.
iv.
Congregations may utilize commissioned ministers and other members of the royal
priesthood to visit the sick, evangelize, catechize, and carry out other duties which
are frequently carried out by pastors (not including the Sacrament of the Altar).
v. Our seminaries may be tasked with preparing sermons for use in vacant
congregations and circumstances when a pastor is unavailable to lead a service, as

vi.

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well as developing curricula for training programs to equip commissioned ministers
and designated laymen to serve in the foregoing ways.
In such circumstances, districts and circuits could develop ways to share the time
and services of pastors. For example, a congregation might be asked to share its
pastor on a monthly or other regular basis with congregations that have no other
access to an ordained minister.

As helpful background to the preceding considerations and suggestions the reader may wish to
consult some of the following documents:
1. The Ministry in Its Relation to the Christian Church (CTCR 1973)
2. Theology and Practice of the Lord’s Supper (CTCR 1983)
3. The Ministry: Offices, Procedures, and Nomenclature (CTCR 1981)
4. Theology and Practice of the Divine Call (CTCR 2003)
5. 2013 Resolution 4-06A Task Force Report (report to 2016 Convention)
6. 2016 Resolution 13-02A To Regularize Status of Licensed Lay Deacons Involved in
Word and Sacrament Ministry
7. The Royal Priesthood: Identity and Mission (CTCR 2018)
8. To Extol and Equip the Blessed Partnership between the Royal Priesthood and the Office
of the Public Ministry (2016 Resolution 13-01A Task Force, report to 2019 Convention)
9. Opinion on Lay Reading of Sermons and Conduct of Worship in the Absence of a Pastor
(CTCR Opinion, 2023).
10. 2019 Res. 6-03A To Enhance the Specific Ministry Pastor (SMP) Program
Adopted
Commission on Theology and Church Relations
October 4, 2024

2026 Convention Workbook