Strategic Plan:
"Serving
the Promise
of our
Mission"
Luther
Seminary
Strategic
Plan 2000-2005
A summary of Luther Seminary’s strategic plan
by Rev David L. Tiede, President |
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Before
Christianity was the religion of the empire, while its bishops were still
pastors in congregations, the
name of the game was teaching, proclamation of the Gospel, and healing.
Let me tell you, God’s mission is alive!
The reform Jesus initiated within Israel brings this same challenge to
Christendom and restores God’s promise to the world.
So what is Luther Seminary’s calling to
serve the church’s missions? Five years ago, confident of God’s
promise, Luther Seminary’s faculty, administration, and boards
unanimously affirmed a mission statement that focuses outside us:
Luther
Seminary educates leaders for Christian communities,
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called and sent by the Holy Spirit
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to witness to salvation through Jesus Christ and
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to serve in God’s world.
Then we wondered. What will Luther Seminary
look like in 5 years if we shape it deeply to serve the promise we made in
our mission statement?
At our January board meeting two years ago,
we began a quest for a shared vision: faculty, board members, staff,
students, and constituents together.
We already had ten years of listening for the Spirit’s call in
the church and five years of a reformed curriculum. Several hundred people
have been working with us in a discernment process, and a faculty staff
writing team has produced ten drafts of a plan entitled Serving the
Promise of our Mission.
On December 15, without dissent, the
faculty affirmed the plan’s vision and goals and called upon the
students, boards, administration and constituencies of Luther Seminary to
join us in making it happen.
“We believe God is calling and sending
the church of Jesus Christ into apostolic mission in the 21st
century world of many cultures and religions,” the plan document begins.
This is a confession of faith in God’s
promise for the church’s future.
At
Luther Seminary, we want to be in on the action!
We
plan to be faithful not only by training pastors to fill the parishes of
Christendom or to maintain the immigrant church. God is calling and
sending Christian communities beyond conserving the faith for themselves.
Luther Seminary must transform theological education into an enterprise
where faithful confession leads to obedient mission.
Luther
Seminary’s four educational arenas serve the church’s future.
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1. Lifelong Learning:
We have a great doctrine of vocation
focused on God’s love for the world, but millions of baptized Christians
have only a faint awareness that God has called and sent them to be Christ
to their neighbor in their relationships, work, and communities. Thousands of congregations can become centers to equip “the
priesthood of believers” or the mission of the baptized. Pastors can be
“apt teachers,” making disciples of Jesus and apostles to the world.
Lifelong learning is the future of a church in mission. As our first
educational arena, we plan to help you do this work.
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Strategic Plan
Update:
Center for Lifelong Learning Equips
Congregations for Ministry
The Center for
Lifelong Learning’s mission is to engage, encourage and strengthen
congregations, pastors and laity around the ministry of the whole
people of God.
See article
from The Story,
vol. 20, no. 1:
Center
for Lifelong Learning Finds Innovative Ways to Equip Congregations
for Ministry.
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2. Specialized Ministry:
God has already called a growing number of
our M.A. students to specialized, non-ordained ministries. These are ministries of teaching, and our new professor of
educational leadership will help us focus on the immense opportunities of
lifelong learning. We could place 10 youth and family leaders for every
one we graduate. As congregations become centers of healing, they also
need leaders in healing ministries: parish nurses, social workers,
ministries to the aging. Luther Seminary is nationally known and
ecumenically collaborative in several of these arenas of leadership. We
expect this growth to continue. God is making the church ready for its
future. Callings to teach and heal are at the frontier of mission.
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Strategic Plan
Update:
Children, Youth and Family
We are aware that
“children, youth and family” represents the growing edge in our
M.A., M.S.M., and certificate offerings in terms of congregational
needs. Our vision is to strengthen this offering and
publicize it as a flagship program at Luther Seminary.
See article
from The Story,
vol. 19, no. 4:
Luther Seminary Takes Youth and family Ministry Programs to New
Level.
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3. Pastoral Leadership:
Luther Seminary educates about one third of
the pastors of the entire ELCA and a growing number for other churches.
The ELCA is asking for two new pastors for each M.Div. graduate available,
and quality outweighs quantity. Our congregations need pastors to announce
God’s mercy and equip vocations. Our graduates must excel in biblical
preaching and worship as well as congregational leadership and mission.
This renewal of our congregations is the promise we serve.
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Strategic Plan
Update:
Preparing Missional Pastors
We believe God is
calling and sending the church of Jesus Christ into apostolic
mission in the 21st century world of many cultures and religions.
See article
from The Story,
vol. 20, no. 2:
Sending
Missional Pastors Prepared for Today's World
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4. Graduate
Theological Leadership:
Since Martin Luther himself, the public
witness of the tradition has been strong in higher education. Our
confidence in the gospel of Jesus Christ has given intellectual courage to
other Christians and engaged non-believers and people of other faiths in
serious dialogue. The graduates of our young Ph.D. program are thriving in
teaching positions around the world. The church needs Luther Seminary’s
full educational depth for its apostolic mission.
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Strategic Plan
Update:
New Ph.D. LeadersWe are taking
leaders already in congregations and giving them new tools and
new ideas to re-energize their ministries. These programs are
prime examples of how Luther’s strategic initiatives are finding
concrete expression.
See article from The Story, vol.
20, no.4:
Post Graduate Programs Train Scholars/Preachers to
Re-energize the Church |
Over
the next 24 months, each of these four arenas will receive the sustained
attention of a work group. The plan offers a host of proposals for what it
will take for this educational work to serve the church's call. That is
the new bottom line: our excellence will be known by our effectiveness
in educating leaders for Christian communities.
The future of the church is interesting and
hopeful because it is God’s! We follow Jesus who sent his followers to
teach, proclaim, and heal. In faith, we glimpse the abundant future of
these missions of the church. We are bold to plan for this future and to
pray the Lord to send laborers into his harvest.
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