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Walking Away From Biblical Truth Has Its Costs, ELCA Flagship Seminary In Financial Trouble

12/13/2012

7 Comments

 
The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America’s largest seminary, Luther Seminary in Minnesota, sent shockwaves through the denomination with the recent admittance that they are facing extreme financial difficulties.  The president of Luther Seminary abruptly stepped down from his position as a result.  Luther Seminary published a report stating, “While we continue to function at a high level, we are facing a difficult combination of challenges, not unlike those faced by many other institutions of higher education.  These challenges include deferred maintenance charges related to aging buildings, the costs of delivering a wide variety of educational programs and a nationwide drop in the number of students attending seminaries . . . this transition comes at a time when the financial performance of the seminary has lagged expectations.” (read here)

The Minneapolis Star Tribune reported that Luther Seminary, “announces search for new president after losing nearly $4 million last school year.”  The report said, “The president of Luther Seminary in St. Paul has resigned amid rising maintenance costs and declining enrollment . . . Enrollment is down from 822 nearly five years ago to 764 students this year.”  Board chairman Jim Lindus said, "We had a lower investment performance than we were expecting, and education costs in general are going up. And we're trying to figure out how do we adjust to that in a church that ... has become smaller."  (read here)  The article also points out that “Other ELCA seminaries nationwide are also dealing with ‘very challenging times.’"

An ELCA pastor, blogging about the news concerning Luther Seminary said, “the ELCA and many of her associated enterprises - Luther Seminary among them - has taken its eye off the ball. We are told that we are to be missional - but missional about what? A vast cohort of students, faculty, and staff (and therefore pastors, bishops, and synod staff) get more worked up about personal pronouns for God than personal relationships with God. We are taught that to ‘want people to come to church on Sunday morning’ indicates a lack of understanding that God works outside the church. We are taught that the Church, and Word & Sacrament, are nice, you know, but so are justice and advocacy. I spent more time in seminary learning about ‘family systems’ than I did sacramental theology. No, for realz. I was assigned more papers about why we shouldn't evangelize, than about how and why we should.”  

This ELCA pastor goes on to say, “certain individuals and departments spend ridiculous amounts of seminary funds on high-end coffee and cookies every day of the week. There are flat-screen TVs in every corner of Northwestern and the OCC. NW and OCC have both recently undergone major asthetic remodels, while the dorms and apartments battle bedbugs and mold year-round.” (read here)

The ELCA is led by self-serving, Bible-denying, and apparently wasteful leaders.  Because of their wandering away from the heart of the Gospel, to make disciples, the denomination itself is withering.

7 Comments
Chuck Braun
12/12/2012 11:00:35 pm

Well, seeing that this seminary has profs who deny the Resurrection of Jesus Christ to their students (Why are they not boycotting or challenging these servants of Satan?), it would be a blessing to see such an institution close! Whoever denies the Resurrection is anti-Christ. "And woe to those who would lead one of these little ones to sin, for it would be better for a millstone to be tied to their necks and have them be cast into the sea!", so saith my Savior and Lord.

Reply
Kathy S
12/13/2012 01:24:26 am

I read the entire blog post by the former seminarian -- she is now a first-call pastor. After I got over the shock, my heart broke for the poor girl. She was completely deceived.

Reply
Blog Author link
12/15/2012 03:46:52 pm

Kathy S,

I very much appreciate your concern, but just so you know - I wasn't ordained in the ELCA with my eyes closed...I knew full well what I was doing when I completed the candidacy process, graduated from seminary, and took the ordination vows. It's a not a perfect place (organization) by any means, but there are still good and faithful laity, pastors, and I believe even bishops and synod staff. God's got me here for some reason, and until he tells me to go elsewhere, I'm doing my best to serve him in the place I've been called to. Again, thanks for reading the blog, and thanks for your sympathy. I pray you keep proclaiming his goodness in your own vocation, and your own ecclesial setting. Gaudete!

Reply
Kathy S
12/17/2012 02:54:35 am


Elizabeth: While I understand to some extent what you are saying, I believe it is not enough to remain in an organization because of "good" people and because you think God has you there for "some reason." You must discern. Without being too graphic, this is why people in the past have remained in and participated in political regimes that have done great harm.

Have you read what Dan Skogen has written on this blog? I am a Lutheran-become-catholic. Martin Luther left the Catholic Church for MUCH LESS than what the ELCA is doing now.

Gaudete? Why?

Blog Author
12/23/2012 03:52:01 pm

With all due respect, Kathy, I have done my discernment work, and to be perfectly frank, it's more than a little offensive to suggest that I haven't. I have prayed and cried and thought and talked and prayed and cried some more. Then I started over, and cried and prayed. Then I talked and thought and prayed and cried and thought and prayed and talked and cried. I have driven myself to physical illness, lost lots of weight, and ground my teeth to the point of developing arthritis in my jaw, all in my attempts to leave - for Rome, the East, evangelicalism, and everywhere in between, and through it all, God has kept my feet firmly planted here in the ELCA. Thank goodness we have a God who says, "You do not understand now what I am doing, but later you will understand." (John 13:7)

By all objective markers, the ELCA (and all of mainline Protestantism) is dying, and the "rational, faithful thing to do" seems (obviously) to be to get out and go elsewhere. But then God's rarely been known for "the obvious", and when I say that God has me here for "some reason", I say that because, this side of heaven, I'm not entirely sure what it is, other than proclaiming the gospel to people who desperately need to hear it.

This will be my last comment here - the more the Enemy gets us to dissect denominational affiliation rather than proclaim the Gospel, the more he wins, and *that*, I simply can't stomach.

Reply
Didaskalos link
12/28/2012 09:52:51 pm

Two issues are in play: your call to be obedient to whatever God is calling you to do and the ineluctable fact of the apostasy and heresy that permeate the ELCA, a denomination whose leadership is manifestly not proclaiming the gospel that Jesus did: ""The Kingdom of God is near! Repent of your sins and believe the Good News!"

If, like Jeremiah, God is calling you to speak His truth to an erring denomination and be faithful as a gospel-preaching pastor in your own church, you need to obey BOTH of those orders. It's not the enemy who has written, "Test everything. Hold fast to that which is good." God inspired that admonition.

The New Testament is replete with Jesus' and Paul's and Jude's and Peter's rebukes and warnings to apostate church leaders, who were tampering with God's Word and encouraging the flock under them to live unrepentantly in Bible-proscribed sin. When the ELCA is blessing sin that the Bible says will cause the unrepentant sinner to forfeit the kingdom of heaven, that's as serious a matter as a denomination can face. If God is calling you to stay and serve in such a denomination, He will also be calling you to be faithful in proclaiming the whole truth -- about sin and grace and repentance and redemption -- of His Word to those under your charge.

Unlike the leadership of the ELCA, the Bible doesn't equivocate about sin, and neither can pastors who follow the Lord of the Church. The Bible doesn't allow for emendations by vote of a denominational convention.

The Bible also holds out the hope of salvation and cleansing and restoration and life-altering change for those who repent of their sins and turn to the Lord, and so must pastors who honor that Word as divinely authored, inerrant, and authoritative.

Reply
Todd
4/27/2013 09:24:37 pm

It sounds like your in torment maybe you should leave sooner than later, I just finished seminary and waiting on God for a church, this sounds very unhealthy what your going through and doesn't sound like this is coming from the Holy Spirit.

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    Prove all things; hold fast that which is good.  
    ​1 Thessalonians 5:21

    Dan Skogen

    Former ELCA seminary student and former ELCA member who is fed up with the ELCA's consistent mockery of God's Word.


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