When Lost in the Woods …

Like so very many of our human family, Lutherans can get lost in the woods. We saw evidence of the frailty a few weeks ago here in Minneapolis.

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America gathered in our city in August for a widely anticipated church-wide convention. A charged and difficult moral issue was on the agenda: whether to appoint practicing gay and lesbian persons to positions of ordained leadership within the church body – as pastors, and bishops, and teachers, let’s say. The assembly approved the idea. And here, in my estimation, an entire family of Lutheran friends lost their way in the woods.

It turns out that Lutherans have developed a strategy for finding their way through difficult and unfamiliar terrain – for finding their way through any significant issue of faith and living, in fact. It involves maps.

On the one hand, we look to the broad witness of the sisters and brothers that surround us, as if to a map. If we feel doubtful about the way forward, we consider the collective wisdom of the church throughout the ages and around the world. The strategy is sometimes called “confessional.”

In a book about Lutheran Confessions, Edmund Schlink explains: “In the Confessions, it is precisely not an individual, but the church which expounds Scripture.” And it is not a fraction of the church, either – a group of individuals gathered in Minneapolis, let’s say. It is the church without “limits, either of time or space,” Schlink tells us. It is “the whole Christian church on earth.” We Lutherans, you see, like to find our way together.

Secondly, and more importantly, we look to the Bible. (This is what Lutheran Confessions are all about as well, of course. Confessions are not about feelings, or culture, or occasional opinions in Minneapolis. They are expositions of the Bible, or they are nothing at all.) Lutherans, you see, have learned to respect the Bible as the Word of God. For many of us, the simple testimony of God’s Word anchors our faith and guides our living in the world. “Out of the Word, as from a spring, flows our entire religion,” explained Martin Luther.

We are a biblical and confessional people: these are the maps that guide us; these are our strategies for faith and life. We look to the collective witness of our sisters and brothers around the world and throughout the ages. And we look to the Bible as God’s own Holy Word. This is precisely why the decisions taken by the ELCA seem so astray and out of character. They seem to tuck our trusted maps away, put a wetted finger into the air, and follow the breeze.

Dr. Richard Mouw is president Fuller Theological Seminary, one of the most respected theological institutions in the nation. In an article appearing in the New York Times, Dr. Mouw explained that the ELCA’s move is “particularly jarring” because Lutherans are “viewed by all of us as one of the more Reformation-rooted, broadly orthodox denominations.” Lutherans tend to “take their theology seriously,” in Mouw’s estimation. The ELCA’s decisions represent “a huge, huge departure for a church like that.”

Our Lutheran sisters and the brothers around the world (not to mention the very wide majority of Christians in general) are thoroughly “jarred” as well. In the days since the ELCA took its historic decision, I have personally heard from Christian leadership on four continents. From an Asian I heard, “The shock wave reaches our shores with dumbfounding effect on the church in our part of the world.” From an African I heard, “[We] do not buy these arguments meant to subvert Biblical truth and theological teaching on which the church has stood for two thousand years.” And from a Latin American I heard, “We cannot accept that the Word of God be trampled in this way.” These are not un-sophisticates, either – as the church around the world is sometimes portrayed by the “enlightened” West. In fact, all three responses come from international leaders with advanced theological degrees from Luther Seminary in St. Paul. Two are ELCA-made Ph.D’s. They represent directly hundreds of thousands of Lutheran sisters and brothers, and indirectly many millions more.

Some of our friends in the ELCA, I am sure, will hail last month’s decision as an act of Christian confession itself. But this is plainly untrue. Confession stands with the church through the ages and around the world, often against the swirling culture prevailing at the time. It does not look inward, to the jumble of conflicting emotions that may prevail within from time to time. When the church wants to take a stand it looks to the far horizon. It thinks of the larger framework. It resists the temptation to absolutize its immediate context or emotion: this is a recipe for “enthusiasm,” in Luther’s language, and quickly losing our way. Christian confession works in exactly the opposite direction. When the church wants to take a stand, it relativizes its immediate context within the broader framework of the church and its witness around the world and throughout the ages. Confessional people do not like to trust wetted fingers. They have learned by experience that the breeze will misguide them.

Yes, unfortunately, Lutherans too can lose their way. But there is an effective strategy to minimize the disposition. Lutherans should know to carry a map. They should know to look to the horizon. For a guide, they must take God’s Word – and learn to depend upon it. For a landmark, they must cling to the Cross of Jesus Christ. As for our little community, this is the map we have chosen. It is the only guide that can assure us of the way.