Lord Have Mercy

Attached below is something one of my congregation's former presidents wrote to me four years ago.  This man was one of the ringleaders who tried to get rid of our pastor over the last four years -- through my entire brief experience as a church council member.  His bragging points over the years were introducing female membership to our voters about forty years ago (not a big deal these days), promoting theistic evolution, writing letters to the congregation stirring up strife and dissent.  He also suggested we emulate the practices of a RIM (LCMS charismatic/pentecostal errorist) pastor in Florida. He later transferred to a congregation that drove away four pastors in a row.

Dr. A.C.  Piepkorn wrote that allowing impenitent members to transfer for the sake of getting them out out of your hair is damage to the unity of Synod, but that's becoming a very common thing.

----- Original Message -----
From: --- ------
To: tcschenks@
Sent: Monday, July 02, 2007 9:37 AM
Subject: Convention

Hi: I was pleased to read you are a delegate to the convention. I hope the delegates in all their wisdom are able to help guide the LCMS in its path to bring Christ to the world.

The LCMS has been loosing members. There is a great diversity among the many individual ministers within the church. I have found that some are attracting people and some are repelling them. This seems to be caused by whether or not the minister follows an extremely conservative stance or not. For instance, although a member of the church since a child, I never heard any Lutheran minister expound his belief that the universe was created in 6 days time. They all seemed to realize that science has disproved this. A few years ago, a Lutheran minister expounded the belief in the 6 (24 hour) days of creation, contrary to all knowledge learned over the past 500 years. Now, this would not be harmful in itself, but it is the type of thing that drives educated people from the church, and the reason we are loosing so many people. Each week, I listen to the frustration of our parishioners in this reguard. I presume they vent their frustration to me because in the past I have help guide the church away from such archaic views as male only voters and positions such as male only secretary.

So, I would hope the delegates would be guided by the churches who are bringing people into the fold as opposed to those who are driving them away. I mention the above paragraph as just an example. In itself, it is not that important, but it is a symptom of the illness spreading its virus throughout the LCMS.

Best wishes, --- ------