The Synod I Love. Three Years Later: What Still Rings True

Submitted by a 2023 LCMS National Convention Delegate

Three years ago, after returning home from the 2023 LCMS National Convention in Milwaukee, I sat down to process what I had experienced. I hoped that with time, those words would become little more than a snapshot of one difficult week in the life of our Synod. Instead, as delegates prepare to gather again for the 2026 National Convention, I find myself reading through the New Business Workbook and feeling many of the same emotions I carried home three years ago.

The names and numbers of the overtures may have changed, but many of the same questions remain. Once again, proposals before the convention ask where women belong, how women may serve, and what role their voices should have in the life of our Synod. Whether those overtures ultimately pass is almost beside the point. Their presence reminds me that the conversations many hoped were settled continue to surface, and that faithful Lutheran women are still asking whether there is room for them in the church they love.

So I find myself returning to these words.

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I was raised by a pastor in a multigenerational pastor’s family. My childhood was full of church life. I attended a Lutheran day school through eighth grade. Sunday mornings were spent in the pew, Wednesdays at chapel, evenings serving at church, and our home was always full of people coming and going. My father’s ministry taught me to love the Church. Never once as a child did I hear that my voice or presence didn’t belong.

As a young woman, I believed the Church was a place where I was safe, where my gifts were welcomed, and where I could serve joyfully as part of the Body of Christ.

As I grew up, I saw the Church at her very best. Because of my father’s position, I also saw her at her worst. Those difficult moments didn’t make me eager to pursue church work or leadership. Yet as an adult, I deeply loved the congregation where I belonged. When I was asked to let my name stand for our executive board, I was honored to become the first female president of our congregation.

That leadership role came during a season when I had young children and a career at a crossroads. I prayed constantly for God to make His will clear. My grandfather’s words echoed in my mind. He would always smile and say, “When you pray, ‘Thy will be done,’ be careful. You may not like where God leads you. But wherever He leads, it’s His plan.”

He was right.

God led me into full-time church work in my thirties. I took off my “church president” hat and stepped into a staff position at my congregation. I do not serve in a called office, but I have never doubted that God has called me to serve His people there. The gifts He has given me fit the needs of this congregation in ways I never could have planned. I became what I often jokingly call a “reluctant but clearly called, non-called church worker.”

When my congregation selected me to let my name stand as a lay delegate for the 2023 LCMS National Convention, I was deeply honored. I had already served as a lay delegate to two district conventions and cared deeply about the future of our Synod. Being chosen to represent my congregation, circuit, and district in Milwaukee felt both humbling and deeply meaningful.

I had been the only woman in the room many times before but nothing prepared me for convention week.

The very first overture delegates attempted to remove from the omnibus for debate questioned women’s participation in the governance of the Synod. I remember sitting quietly in my seat thinking, Are we really debating whether women should even have a voice here?

I wasn’t reading about the discussion. I was part of it.

I had been elected by my congregation. I had been entrusted by my district. Yet before we had even settled into convention, the legitimacy of women like me participating in the work of the Synod was itself being questioned. That moment stayed with me because it exposed something much deeper than parliamentary procedure.

Throughout Scripture, women are portrayed as faithful disciples, teachers of the faith within their homes, prophets, servants of God’s people, coworkers in the Gospel, sisters in Christ, and co-heirs of the grace of life. Throughout the history of the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, women have faithfully served in countless vocations that have strengthened Christ’s Church. None of that felt visible in that moment. Instead, I found myself wondering whether the Church I loved still had room for women like me.

The week continued with conversations that often sounded polite on the surface.

“Is your husband here?”

“Is your pastor here?”

“Who’s watching your children?”

“You should encourage your husband to study Luther’s Small Catechism more.”

“You should have more children. They are such a blessing.”

Individually, some of these comments may have been offered innocently, but I know they weren’t - they communicated something deeper.

Who gave you permission to be here?

What man speaks for you?

Who authorizes your presence?

It often felt as though my own calling to serve faithfully wasn’t enough. My place at the table needed validation through someone else’s authority.

Thankfully, that was not everyone’s posture. Some pastors and delegates intentionally sought out conversations with women. They listened. They encouraged. They treated women not as problems to solve or exceptions to tolerate, but as fellow members of Christ’s Body serving alongside them for the sake of the Gospel. I remain profoundly grateful for those men. They reminded me that Christ’s Church is bigger than our disagreements and that the Holy Spirit continues to work through people marked by humility, kindness, and genuine love for one another.

Unfortunately, the sharpest words came after convention ended. Online, the restraint often disappeared.

“People like you shouldn’t still be in this Synod.”

“You’d be happier in the ELCA.”

“You’re not really Lutheran.”

Most of those comments came from called workers - men entrusted with preaching Christ’s mercy. That reality grieved me more than anything else. The deeper I became involved in conversations about the future of our church body, the clearer it became that these were not isolated voices.

For many faithful women, the message increasingly sounded the same: You don’t belong here.

If this is what some lay women experience, I cannot help but think about the women who have devoted their entire vocational lives to serving Christ’s Church.

How often have they been expected to make themselves smaller simply to avoid criticism?

Women who serve faithfully in the LCMS are not asking to be pastors. They are asking to be treated as indispensable members of Christ’s Body whose gifts are received with gratitude rather than suspicion. That should not be controversial.

Three years have passed since Milwaukee.

I wish these reflections felt outdated.

Instead, as I read the overtures before the 2026 convention, I recognize many of the same conversations returning once again. The particulars may differ, but the underlying questions remain remarkably familiar.

Where do women belong?

How should women serve?

Should their voices be welcomed and lifted up or merely tolerated?

These are not merely questions about convention procedure.

They are questions about how we see one another as members of Christ’s Body.

I still love the Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod. I love her theology. I love her commitment to Scripture. I love the congregations where ordinary Christians gather around Word and Sacrament every week. I love the pastors who faithfully preach Christ crucified. I also love the countless Lutheran women who quietly keep serving and some who serve loudly - because Christ has called them to love His people.

Women teach children.

Women organize mercy ministries.

Women lead schools.

Women care for grieving families.

Women mentor young believers.

Women support their pastors and their congregations.

Women raise children in the faith.

Women serve with extraordinary humility and faithfulness, often without recognition.

The Church is stronger because women serve.

My prayer for this convention is not that everyone leaves in agreement. Faithful Christians have wrestled with difficult questions throughout the history of the Church, and they always will.

The question before us is bigger than governance, bylaws, or who may stand behind a microphone. The real question is whether the LCMS will recognize and receive the gifts Christ Himself has poured out on His Church or whether we will silence some of those gifts because they make us uncomfortable.

I still believe what I learned as a little girl sitting in my father’s church: Christ did not give gifts to His people so they could be hidden. He gave them for the building up of His Body and the proclamation of the Gospel.

The Church is strongest when every girl, boy, woman and man is encouraged to faithfully use the gifts God has given. It is weakest when fear, suspicion, or power convince us to leave those gifts on the sidelines.

Long after the votes are counted and the microphones are turned off, the mission remains the same: preach Christ, love our neighbor, and build up the Body He purchased with His own blood. I pray we leave this convention having done exactly that.