LCMS Convention Workbook St. Louis, Missouri — 1973, Page 288

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288 PARISH SERVICES AND YOUTH

agencies, urging statistical analysis, soul accounting efforts, and
vigorous outreach in harmony with the Great Commission.

6. Emphasized the need for quality Christian education as
one of God's expectations when He commissioned the church to
teach God’s people.

IV. THE BOARD OF PARISH EDUCATION Is
COMMITTED TO PROVIDING THE BEST POSSIBLE
STUDY PROGRAMS AND MEDIA FOR TEACHING
AND LEARNING THE FAITH

The Synod has delegated to its Board of Parish Education
the task of planning and directing the production of books and
other materials needed for an effective program of parish educa-
tion (Handbook 7.25). Throughout its history the Board has
devoted much of its staff time to the development of curricular
plans and materials, especially for the teaching of the Christian
faith through basic courses of study.

Because the Board is committed to providing the best pos-
sible study guides and resources for the various schools and
programs of local congregations, its staff has not only promoted
the best use of existing materials. It has also regularly revised
its previously published programs and periodically developed
some new lesson materials.

The Mission: Life Program

For a number of timely reasons, reported to the Synod at
previous conventions and through other communications, the
Board of Parish Education resolved on Jan. 21, 1969, after ex-
tensive staff studies. to authorize the development of a new
coordinated curriculum for teaching and learning the Christian
faith in the various parish church schools. This huge endeavor,
later to be called the Mission:Life Program, has engaged most
of the time and energy of the Board's staff ever since the Board
made its courageous decision in love of God and His church.
The preparation of the major part of the Mission:Life Pro-
gram required a 3-year period. Hundreds of fellow pastors and
teachers were involved in preparing and evaluating the manu-
scripts for the 182 courses and the thousands of items included
in teachers kits and student packets.
All of the publishing resources of Concordia Publishing
House are being used to the fullest in what by God's grace and
blessing has become one of the largest and most amazing pub-
lication programs ever undertaken by a church denomination
or publishing corporation. Not enough can be said about the
unreserved support, cooperation, and dedication of Concordia
Publishing House management, artists, and craftsmen in the
production of the materials. God be praised for this marvel of
His Spirit and grace without which the Mission: Life program
could not have come into being!
The first of the Mission:Life courses were introduced to the
Synod in the spring of 1971 for initial use in the fall of that year.
Since then the Board of Parish Education editors and Concordia
Publishing House employees have been working unstintingly
and heroically to keep the flow of course materials at the high-
est possible level of quality and on schedule. The materials for
third-year courses are in production and will appear for initial
use in the 1973-1974 school year. The 1973 fall quarter kits and
packets are already available for examination and are being in-
troduced in workshops for teachers and leaders of the agencies.
With the appearance of the third year of courses for prekin-
dergarten (ages 3 and 4), 6th, 7th, 8th, and 12th grade classes
in day and weekday schools, the Mission:Life program will
have made available complete and closely graded lesson plans
and related materials for all age levels in four color-coded series:
a Blue 4—5 session weekly program primarily for day schools
(preprimary, elementary, and secondary):

a Red 2-hour weekly program covering 36 sessions:

a Green series of one-hour-a-week session plans designed for
Sunday morning classes:

an Orange 10 session, 24-hour program for vacation Bible

schools or other summer church programs.

New “Christ-Style Resources” for youth classes will replace
the Spirit/Talk Resources in fall 1973 on a continuous but short-
term, undated basis (6-week units). The Gate, the Green study
guide for adult groups, will continue to offer a variety of courses
on a quarterly basis. New Orange (VBS and camp) materials
now appear annually on eight levels, including youth and adult.
Some Red adult courses (for six 2-hour weekday sessions) will
continue to appear twice a year.

Response to Concerns About Mission:Life

What about revisions and improvements of previously pub-
lished Mission:Life courses? Any human production is bound
to be less than perfect and subject to improvement. As a part
of its commitment to provide the best possible study programs
and media resources for the teaching of the Christian faith, the
Board of Parish Education and its staff are more than ready to
revise, correct, and improve the Mission: Life materials. In fact,
its editors eagerly create and await opportunities for critical
review and desirable changes of whatever they produce.

In response to some expressed criticisms and concerns about
the Mission:Life program, the Milwaukee convention was
assured that “the primary concern of the Mission: Life editors
is that the theology, doctrine, and content of all Mission:Life
courses, as well as the teaching of them, be in accord with the
Holy Scriptures, the Lutheran Confessions, and the officially
adopted resolutions of the Synod. To this end the editors subject
their work to not just one but a number of established review
procedures, including the critique of official theological re-
viewers.” The convention also was assured that the editors
“stand ready to make revisions at their earliest Opportunity.”

As a way of checking on the validity of the criticisms of a
number of overtures regarding some details of Mission:Life
courses, the Milwaukee convention resolved “that the synodical
Board of Doctrinal Review be charged with the responsibility
of reviewing immediately the material critically.” To implement
this resolution, all first and second quarter course materials
and manuscripts were resubmitted for a second review (they
had been reviewed and approved previously). It can be reported
that all courses that were under criticism have been reviewed
officially a second time and that all Mission: Life course materials
have been approved by official theological reviewers appointed
by the President of the Synod.

In the light of reviews and the comments and suggestions
of other members of the Synod, corrections and improvements
were made immediately in a number of published courses. All
unpublished manuscripts are revised in the light of valid criti-
cisms before they are published. And now that the demanding
tasks of preparing new courses has in large part been com-
pleted, at least temporarily, some of the Board of Parish Educa-
tion staff is giving attention to the possibilities of large-scale
revisions of those courses that have been least satisfying to
pastors, teachers, and parents of the church, particularly in the
Green series.

Plans for Revisions of Mission:Life

For example, a reconstructed course on the care of God’s
world for grade 3 in the Green series will become available
already in fall 1973.

An alternate course plan for the Green 3! course titled Our
Environment—the Earth has been prepared and added to the
existing Teachers Kit as a supplement. The alternate plan uses
all the original kit material on God’s work of creation and the
care of His world, but compresses the previous three units into
two and provides a third unit of four new sessions on the new
heaven and the new earth which God promises through Jesus
Christ. This supplement allows previous as well as new pur-
chasers of the Green 3! Teachers Kit to use the course either as
originally planned or according to the revised plan. The sup-
plement will be available to previous purchasers of the course
and has been added to all kits in stock.

Nursery and Kindergarten Life-in-Christ and Mission:Life
story books that appeared in the first four quarters of the 2-year
series of materials will be changed and perforated so that Sun-
day schools can continue to send home story pages weekly
instead of using a quarterly book (if they prefer to do so). Other
changes have been made in papercraft and kit items to improve
them. The Teachers Guide for the 1973 fall quarter has been
revised.

The Life-in-Christ Old Testament series of lessons that will
again begin in December 1973 will include the Christmas and
Easter stories in the December and March quarters to satisfy
those who prefer to break the chronological sequence in ob-
servance of the church year.

A number of student papers in the Green 7° course titled
My Faith and Others were revised already for the March 1973
quarter, and a thorough revision of the Green 7! course titled
The Case for God's Power will appear in 1974. Many other cor-
rections and improvements will be incorporated into the ma-
terials as they are reprinted.