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LCMS 2026 Convention Workbook: Reports and Overtures, PDF page 527

the government), and in the Synod “the Office of the Ministry” has 
been termed “the highest office in the Church” (Francis Pieper, 
Christian Dogmatics  Vol. III [St. Louis: Concordia Publishing 
House, 1953], 461), which should not be understood as 
contradicting the rest of what Pieper wrote about the ministry 
(extensively citing the Bible, Luther, and the Lutheran 
Confessions); and 
WHEREAS, It is good and helpful to distinguish between the men 
whom God has called to perform the duties of the divinely instituted 
preaching office in the Ch urch (Predigtamt) fo r proclaiming and 
teaching God’s Word and administering the Sacraments 
(pastor/bishop/teaching elder), on the one hand, and the men and 
women whom churches may appoint to perform other duties or hold 
other offices in the churches, who are expected to believe, teach, 
confess, and uphold the same confession of faith; and it is helpful 
for the Synod to certify and keep records of those who have been 
deemed qualified and have been appointed or called to these other 
offices; and 
W
HEREAS, The New Testament uses various terms to describe 
how people are designated or authorized to perform God- pleasing 
duties in the Church, such as, “called” ( κλητὸς, Rom. 1:1; 1 Cor. 
1:1), “call” ( καλέω, Gal. 1:15), “set apart” ( ἀφορίζω, Acts 13:2; 
Rom. 1:1; cf. Gal. 1:15) or “appoint” ( ἀναδείκνυμι, Luke 10:1; 
“point out,” Acts 1:24; καθίστημι, “put in charge,” Acts 6:3; Titus 
1:5; Heb. 5:1; see also Matt. 24:45– 47; 25:21–23; ποιέω, “make,” 
Mark 3:14; Heb. 3:2; τίθημι, “set,” John 15:16 and 1 Cor. 12:28; 1 
Tim. 2:7; 2 Tim. 1:11; “by prophecy with the laying on of hands,” 
1 Tim. 4:14; or “ordain” [KJV, the Greek word χειροτονέω involves 
either laying on hands or a show of hands, Acts 14:23], or “appoint 
choose, or hand-pick,” 2 Cor. 8:19), but there is no mention of 
ordaining (initiating s omeone into a specific “order”) or 
commissioning (though it does mention “putting in charge” or 
“appointing,” καθίστημι, Acts 6:3) of the people who are to do other 
kinds of service or hold other offices in the Church; and 
WHEREAS, Historically the Synod has affirmed that, “the 
preaching office is conferred by God through the congregation as 
the possessor of all ecclesiastical power, or the Keys, and through 
the call that is prescribed by God. The ordination of those who are 
called with laying on of hands is not a divine institution but an 
apostolic, churchly order and only a solemn public ratification of 
the call” (C.F.W. Walther, Ministry Thesis VI,  1852; in ed. 
Harrison, The Church and the Office of the Ministry  [CPH, 2012], 
p. 5), a position reaffirmed by 2001 Resolution 7-17A, “To Affirm 
Synod’s Official Position on Church and Ministry” ( Proceedings, 
172–73); and 
WHEREAS, For most of its history, the Synod carefully 
distinguished between pastors, who serve in the “preaching office” 
or “pastoral office,” which “is not a human institution but an office 
that God himself has established” (C.F.W. Walther, Ministry Thesis 
II, Church and Ministry , p. 5), “the highest office in the Church, 
from which flow all other offices in the Church” (Ministry Thesis 
VIII, ibid.), on the one hand, and “auxiliary offices,” which in 
biblical times included the offices of elders and the deaconate , and 
in Walther’s day included the offices of “schoolteachers who have 
the Word of God in their schools, distributors of alms, sextons, 
precentors [i.e., leaders of singing] at public worship, and others” 
listed in Ministry Thesis VIII, section 1 of Church Ministry (ibid., 
p. 286); and 
WHEREAS, The current Synod Constitution and Bylaws use non-
biblical terminology for these two groups of workers in the church 
(“ministers of religion —ordained” and “ministers of religion—
commissioned”) instead of biblical terms, making a distinction 
without biblical difference (e.g., what we call “the Great 
Commission” was delivered to men whom Jesus appointed to the 
Divine Office, who are currently rostered as “ordained ministers,” 
while there is no biblical term for those currently rostered as 
“commissioned minister,” those whom God permits the church to 
appoint to serve in ways other than public preaching and teaching 
of God’s Word and administering the Sacraments); and 
WHEREAS, Historically the Synod, in its Constitution and 
Bylaws, has referred to “pastors” also as “ministers of the Gospel,” 
and referred to other theologically trained church workers by 
various terms that describe their training, duties, or functions; and 
WHEREAS, The practices of the Synod have become examples to 
Lutheran churches around the world, living under the laws of 
widely divergent governments, and the doctrine and terminology of 
Lutheran churches should not be determined by the civil 
governments in which we find ourselves; and 
WHEREAS, The terminology “minister of religion—ordained and 
ministers of religion—commissioned” (Const. Art. V) first entered 
into Constitution in 1992, replacing the historic wording (through 
1986): 
Membership in the Synod is held and may be acquired by 
congregations, ministers of the Gospel, and teachers of the 
Evangelical Lutheran Church who confess and accept the 
confessional basis of Article II. 
and 
WHEREAS, From 1989 through 2004 the Synod in convention 
added numerous man -made offices to the list of “ministers of 
religion—commissioned,” incorporating the graduates of programs 
offered by various colleges and universities of the Synod: 
Membership in the Synod is held and may be acquired by 
congregations, ministers of the Gospel, teachers, and 
deaconesses of the Evangelical Lutheran Church who confess 
and accept the confessional basis of Article II. (1989 Const. Art. 
V); 
Membership in the Synod is held and may be acquired by 
congregations, ministers of religion— ordained and ministers of 
religion—commissioned, such as teachers, directors of Christian 
education, directors of Christian outreach, and deaconesses of 
the Evangel ical Lutheran Church who confess and accept the 
confessional basis of Article II. (Const. Art. V; added 1992; 
“certified lay ministers” added in 1995; “parish assistants” added 
in 1998; “directors of parish music” added in 2001; “directors of 
family life ministry” added in 2004; the “such as” list was moved 
to the Bylaws in 2019); 
and 
The following two whereases are present only in the Central Illinois 
District Board of Directors submission: 
W
HEREAS, The Central Illinois District has for the most part 
continued using the historic/biblical terms “pastor” and “teacher” in 
its Constitution and Bylaws (which also conform more to the terms 
commonly used in congregations to refer to these workers whom 
we a uthorize to teach the faith) after the Synod changed its 
terminology in its Constitution and Bylaws; and 
2026 Convention Workbook
492 STRUCTURE AND ADMINISTRATION